Day 38:It's not mirth, it's hysteria

Eeeeeeeeep, nearly time to be off!
Last night sort of almost went to plan. After I remembered to get a pizza on the way home (shopping list read: water purification stuff, anti-sickness pills, pizza) we did at least eat.
Poor little dog-in-law got progressively glum as the evening wore on, normally he's the centre of attention but I was glued to the laptop and the phone. Then I bought the rucksacks downstairs and he lost all hope.
Finally started packing at about 10pm, then unpacked a bit, then packed a bit more, decided I had too many socks, took socks out, put finger paints in, swapped some t-shirts for some crayons etc etc til I had no idea what to pack or wear.
Finally rucksack was full, felt very pleased with myself. Turned round and discovered heap of other stuff I was meant to take. Decided it could go in Mr Halford's bag.
Mr Halford returned from his second stint at work, went upstairs, scooped up an armload of stuff and had his bag packed in about 2 1/2 minutes. Then said, with some satisfaction, 'there's still loads of room in my bag' (not any more - I shoved all my make-up and extra underwear in there this morning).

And then, since it was midnight I tried the online check-in. About a million times. It didn't work. Waved booking confirmation paper at laptop in pleading fashion. No joy.
Thought, 'there'll be some perfectly logical reason as to why Virgin Atlantic have none of my details, I shall ring them up.'
Found a phone number with the reassuring words 'line open 24/7' after it and gave it ring. Got through to the 'all other enquiries' bit and listened to some modern  popular music. And that was it. No interrupting 'you are in a queue' or 'your call is important to us' type message. Hmmmm, began to reflect on 'line open 24/7' not necessarily meaning there was anyone there to answer the call.
Hung up, tried a flight re-confirmation option. Got a cheery automated 'no need to re-confirm your flight' message and then a dead end.
Hung up, dialled the first number again and this time hung on for grim death.
Hurrah, a lovely Welsh lady answered, did some typing and found the agent hadn't put any spaces in our names. Hoopla! problem solved. Then there was a loud static noise, such as may be heard at the apocalypse and the nice Welsh lady disappeared. I looked at the phone in confusion.
Welsh lady duly reappeared, but shrieking a lot. I tried being soothing but she couldn't hear me and kept shrieking 'Charles! the phones have gone! don't panic. NO ONE PANIC'
I left her to her not-panicking and gently put the phone down.

Triumphantly checked-in, printed boarding passes and gave the miserable dog a carrot, which cheered him up a bit because he loves carrots and thinks they are the best treat ever.

Day 37: AAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGHHHHHH!!!!

I'll say that again.

Aaaaaaarrrrrrrgggghhhhhh!!!!

Oh snakes alive, if ever there was a day to stick my head in a bucket of chocolate, this was it.
Just as I thought I'd defeated the chocolate gremlins, they come right back to haunt me.
Last night I thought it would be a good idea to get our currency ordered so we could pick it up from the airport, so I got on to the interweb and put the order in. The payment didn't work. I phoned my bank. Lo, their very efficient (annoyingly too efficient) anti-fraud system thought it looked suspicious. Spoke to a nice lady who gave me a number to ring and I resolved to try again the next morning.

Got up in the middle of the night (6am) to make sure I was all ready with hair combed and make-up on in order to phone the anti-fraud line at 8am (good impressions count). Phoned the line to find there were no actual people there, but a somewhat weird question system which I used the keypad to answer. It was a bit like trying to communicate with aliens, but still, it seemed to work until it asked me to confirm some recent purchases. There were quite a lot of them. All on Saturday morning. Hmmm.

Anyhoo, buoyed by this success I tried again. It didn't work. Phoned the bank again and spoke to two nice people who assured me all is well and fixed now. Would have tried again but had to gallop to work.
Went through the whole fandango again in my lunch break. Gave up, thought I'd ring up instead. Checked the website and saw the lines close at 5.30. Perfect.

Left work, bought last minute essential medication and the like and hoofed it up the hill in a manner to rival my 1996 land speed record for a flip-flop wearer success. Grabbed phone at 5.15, ring ring, 'thank you for calling......our lines are now closed' WHAT???!!! 'Our opening hours are 9 am to 5pm, please call back then.
Yes, I will call you then, but in the meantime I shall send you a very cross email.
I believe this places me at roughly point 4 on the 'losing it' scale i.e. 'a visit to strop central'

Ooooof.
OK off to pack my 'reasonable amount of reading material for the flight'. Choices, choices.

Day 36: packing is for wimps

Hmmm, really ought to do some packing.

Today I bought home all the donated loot from school and tried to take a photo of it. There was so much of it that it completely covered the settee and I couldn't fit it all in the frame.
Tally so far:
Posters (30)
Coloured paper (345 sheets)
Finger paints (32)
Plastic letters (4 random containers)
Wax crayons (168)
Coouring pencils (318)

and oodles more besides. Pity the poor drama teacher who offered me a lift home only to then have a box of loot shoved in his arms while I went to fetch the other one from the staff room. Then I remembered the massive cool box was still in library so fetched that too and in no time at all the car was full.

Unlike my rucksack which currently has nothing in it.

Day 35: Wooo! Back on the information superhighway

So many good things going on.
Yesterday I read 'Out of Shadows' by Jason Wallace, which is jolly terrific and gives you loads to think about and really, you should be rushing out right now to get your mitts on a copy (unless you are a young person as it's quite violent). (Well, really violent).

The dog is here! He had a major sneezing fit earlier but is all recovered now.

I got yet more splendid things to take to Nepal, and yesterday our lovely caretaker, Mr Cage, helped me wrestle the posters into a cardboard tube so they wouldn't get flattened on the way there.

I managed to buy someone a Mars Bar this morning and got it all the way to work and safely delivered without hoovering it up.
I fended off a 6th former who was trying to sell me some chocolate at lunchtime (behold my superb willpower!)

I met the nice dog from down the terrace who looks terrifying but turns out to be quite nice (at least while I'm hiding behind a gate).

OK, Mr Halford is determined we should do some packing, can't argue with that, only 3 more sleeps to go!

Day 34:(I'm not here, I've lost internet access)

(No, really.)

Day 33: new shoes!

New shoes! And a big day out in London with Mr Halford and Mum and Dad. And lots of sunshine and everything.
Giving up chocolate is proving a bit financially ruinous; yesterday I bought a pair of shoes, two frocks and two tops. Where will it all end?
Bankrupcy, possibly.
On the plus side my lovely Mum bought a majestic bag of crayons over today for us to stuff in our rucksacks.
Eeeep!
Only 5 more sleeps to go!

Day 32: not even any cheating or anything

Snakes alive, I have made it to day 32 without any cheating. How very unlikely.
Achieved almost nothing off my 'to do' list yesterday bar buying stocks of bird food.
I got very distracted by buying frocks and summery things, then discovered my small neice was over at the outlaws and so went over to play with her, then ended the day by having a trot round Hatfield Forest and baking some biscuits.
As a consequence I now have quite a lot to do before my parents arrive at 10am Sunday.
Also, all my library books arrived - finally - so I now have 4 to read before we jet off on Friday. And we haven't packed yet.
I wouldn't have time to eat any chocolate even if I wanted to!

Day 31: Fridays are the new Fridays (official)

Oh at last, Fridays have returned to being Fridays. Once again a beautifully warm and sunny day, so smiles all round.
I bagged a lift to work with a colleague for the second morning in a row (luckily, as I was trying to carry a hugemungous cool box down the road) and completed the hat trick as I got a lift home earlier in the week too.
Such are my nice friendly work colleagues - yesterday I was offered a lift while conspicuously carrying a tin of biscuits, today I it was a cool box that could possibly be full of beer (it wasn't, which will guarantee no lift on Monday).

All sorts of random excitement around school today - an ice lolly sale at break time which went incredibly well, and a visiting band (twenty twenty) with many a swooning teenage girl at break time. I was given some more goodies to take to Nepal and had to make a second collection box to put in the staff room.

My lovely friendly 6th formers were planning a get together at one of their houses tonight, 'til I reminded the potential host that the last time this happened he was found in the library wailing 'my house is in tatters because of you!'. They then decided to hold it at the house of the friend who wasn't present. Good thinking.

Then, even better, I got home to find I had won a book in a competition.

Nicely played Friday, good recovery.

Day 30:woooooooooo!

Today was excellent for many reasons, but mostly because of the Year 11 music recital which featured several jawdroppingly good performances. Even if I wasn't completely biased I'd still think they were brilliant.
Plus there were also excellent cakes in the interval
Even more plus, got home to find we are dog sitting for one more night as the outlaws are getting back from their hols late. The dog was wild with joy to see me, mostly because he thought he'd get fed again. But still.

In a fit of daring I purchased some chocolate brownies for someone (without their knowledge) and managed to give them to them without eating any first. An unexpected triumph.

Day 29: even more muchos excitement

Yay! An excellent day today! Not only was it lovely and sunny and suchlike but 2 (two) parcels arrived today. One parcel contained 'Little Princes' by Conor Grennan, an account of how an initially casual volunteering experience in Nepal grew into a mission to an all consuming commitment to help some victims of child trafficking amidst the horrors of the civil war. I'm making it sound terribly serious and worthy, but so far it has been warm, funny and enlightening, though it doesn't shirk from the grittier side of life.

The second parcel contained the posters I ordered on Monday afternoon and they are so fabulous I had to do a bit of spontneous dancing. Really, they are great. You have no idea how great. I'm still really excited about them.

Got home and resisted the urge to sit in the gorious sun and read my new book. Instead, I set about baking some coconut and cherry shortbread. It was much like the cake baking episode of the other week but most of the chaos was caused by a localised fog of icing sugar and too many shoes in front of the fridge so the door wouldn't open properly and then there was a bit of a landslide of shortbreads. Only one made a proper bid for freedom (it got as far as the bin) the rest were juggled back on to the baking sheet and shoved into the newly excavated fridge.

If Mr Halford is reading this: this is why your shoes are all in a pile in the middle of the living room floor.

Day 28: a month without chocolate (if it was February)

(which it isn't, so I am cheating a bit) (never mind)

Had a great day playing at libraries, with only a few cataloguing related mishaps such as accidentally taping my hair to the books when putting the spine labels on. Could happen to anyone. Possibly not bald people though.

Still no sign of my reserved books in the public library which gives me a great excuse to read something else. Like Failbook.

Day 27:muchos excitement

So much excitement in fact, that I forgot to update the blog.
Today I ordered 27 posters to take to Nepal, hurray! They should be here early next week, which is lucky since we are leaving at the end of it.
Also, we are looking after the dog-in-law for a few days and he is all cheery and affectionate  - much the thing for lack of chocolate miseries.

Day 26: what I lack in chocolate, I make up for with treacle tart

Another lovely sunny day here, apart from the current downpour.
As it's Mother's Day I called my Mum at about 8.30 this morning only to discover that she had already opened all her presents from me. On to part two - making a treacle tart for the family gathering at the outlaws. Managed to get all the right ingredients in, in the right order this time, and get it cooked on time despite a detour out to buy some plants for the garden.
Raced over to the outlaws and had a curry fest so tasty that we all over indulged and had to go for a walk before we could manage pudding.
A large amount of chocolates appeared from somewhere so I had to hide in the kitchen moving things about in the oven so that I wouldn't fall prey to their cheeky advances.
Very snoozy now, and I would so much like a hot chocolate but it's all off-limits so Mr Halford has made a coffee version instead. Genius!

Day 25: Are we nearly there yet?

Why is there so long to go until Easter, why?
Possibly it's because I haven't yet learned to suffer my lack of chocolate with good grace.
A lovely sunny day today, sat out in the garden at my outlaws reading the rest of Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld - a fine example of steampunk, should you be in need of one.
And now on to A Hat Full of Sky.

Day 24: Look on the Carnegie shortlist, ye Mighty, and despair!

Fridays are the new Mondays. I now have conclusive proof.

Whiffled into work with a spring in my step and a tin of biscuits in my hand. All was well with the world.

Got to work, checked emails, all went wrong.

For lo, there lurking in my inbox like a roasting tin that you turn round and catch sight of just after you’ve drained all the washing up water, was an email from CILIP with the new Carnegie 2011 shortlist.

And what a list.

I’m still seething hours later. Admittedly there is always at least one howler on there. The type of book that has us all scratching our heads asking ‘how could they shortlist that? How could they? Did they even read it?’

This year that book is ‘Monsters of Men’. 300 pages too long, central characters with no development and a bleating tendency to cry each others names in agonised fashion, a plot the author couldn’t be bothered with, quite a good bit with a horse and the biggest cop-out ending to rival ‘it was all just a dream’.

Such is my loathing for this book – inexcusably bad when the two preceding it were so good – that it has instantly made me despise the rest of the shortlist. Quite unreasonably so, since I’ve only read one other book on it.

When I saw MoM on the longlist I did half jokingly say that I’d ditch Carnegie completely if it made the shortlist, since there was absolutely no reason for it to do so. Now it’s happened I find that I really do want nothing to do with it.

Oh dear, dear. Excuse me while I pick all my toys up and put them back in my pram.

Day 23:oh what larks

The last day of March and oodles of assessed practicals going on at school. No reported sightings of the art students who were all tucked away being creative. Occassional sightings of the theatre studies students gambolling around in costume seeking an audience for their drama pieces. A bit of hasty research needed into histograms (disappointingly, not a random singing historian but some sort of graph thing) and frequency density (sums, grimsters). And then a group of Year 12 scientists trampling about in the undergrowth peering at some ivy, under the watchful eye of a nearby biology teacher who explained 'assessed practical' with a glint in her eye that suggested she had made the whole thing up for a laugh. The scientists looked very intent though.
Exciting afternoon as the ever-cheerful BTEC PE crowd were in and they insisted on singing to me (though as we were in a library they did ask nicely first).
Bought some more chocolate covered coffee beans on the way home as my husband had discovered the first lot and scoffed them. So much for my carrot at the end of the tunnel.
Tomorrow it will be only two weeks until we set off. Woo-hoo!

Day 22: Small things to be cheerful about

It's raining, there are still more than two weeks to go until the Easter holidays, exams are on the horizon, there's a woman on TV boiling half a pigs head to make a traditional English meal, there's a sheep with a poorly toe and I've had no chocolate for AGES. Not even a chocolate button.

Unleash the standby list of emergency things-to-cheer-you-up:
#1  ICanHasCheezburger.com
#2 getting someone else to do the washing up
#3 having a cup of tea and a nice sit down
#4 homemade treacle tart
#5 wearing earrings with parrots on.

That'll do for today.

No! hang on, surprise late entry from pigs-head-boiling lady:
"Anyone who thinks they've never eaten eyeballs is just pain kidding themselves."

Consider yourself unkid.

Day 21:Get thee behind me, chocolate pudding

Another fun-packed Tuesday, but this time with the added frisson of summer exam timetables. Cue some white faces and hiding under desks.
I was greatly cheered by the convening of the Stortford Library Massive in the evening, before the other schools break up and we are scattered 'cross the face of the globe. It was all very therapeutic, so much so that when the inevitable chocolate pud turned up I was quite able to fend it off without crying or anything.

Day 20:another glorious failure

Ho hum, pigs bum, as they say in Switzerland and Louise Rennison books. Another Monday, another epic failure at the rural riddle on Radio Norfolk (although my second guess was otter, which it turned out to be). (Second guesses don't count though).

On the other hand, I've still had no chocolate - hurray - and I've just made a tremendous macaroni cheese - double hurray.

On that small triumph, I shall retire.

Day 19:On the impossibility of conveying snorts by telegram

Not only was today sunny and lovely, but it was also productive.
Good things: filled in census form online with nary a hiccup (possibly because at least half the population were still asleep having forgotten to change their clocks, or because like me, they harboured suspicions that the site wouldn't work), did lots of gardening, had a whiffle around Hatfield Forest, had an ice cream, had a lovely Skype phone chat with my friend Yolande

Not altogether great things: Gremlins in the Skype system meant that Yolande sometimes sounded like an alien but at least we understood each other

Just as I was being amused by the incident in 'The Ascent of Rum Doodle' in which the climbing party are faced with 30,000 porters instead of the 3,000 they wanted (explanation: 'the Yogistani word for three was identical with the word for thirty, except for a sort of snort in the middle. It was, of course, impossible to convey this snort by telegram, and the Bang had chosen to interpret the message as ordering 30,000 porters.) it seems I was also making a foolish error. Even as I type, Mr Halford is cheerfully applying for my entry into 'the Bishop's Stortford 10', which I had assumed was a 10k run. It turns out it is 10 miles. TEN MILES. No wonder he was surprised I agreed to it.

Day 18: Snoozing about

Snoozy day today after wild and taxing night out last night (two J2O's, a ginger ale and use of chopsticks).
This chocolate-free diet is severely depleting my energy levels.

I summoned up enough oomph to trot down to the library where I returned my library book and managed to break two of their lovely shiny new issuing machine things. This never happened when there were actual humans to help you.
I also read, and recommend 'Around The World In A Bad Mood' by Rene Foss. I'm tempted to get a copy to take with me to Nepal. Or maybe 8 copies to give to stressed out passengers.

I only found out last night about the spending cut protests taking place in London on Saturday, otherwise I'm sure I'd have been there. Watching the news tonight there were the inevitable sad scenes of trouble makers trying to cause mayhem and destruction, apparently wanting to turn Trafalgar Square into 'another Pearl Square' a la the protests in Bahrain. Hmmm, except that in Bahrain they are fighting for democracy and the right to have a say in who is running their country and how. We do have that right here and if we had all voted we may have got a Government that implemented the necessary cuts in a less controversial and painful way. Still, I'm sure the protesters were first in the queue when the polling stations opened. Weren't they?

Day 17: Thank Crunchie it's Friday

Except, of course, Crunchies are off the menu.
Had a very sophisticated evening meeting friends in a pub in Leicester square and then trotted into Chinatown for some food. There were some cross stroppy moments about menus with Shark Fin soup on the menu (and, more weirdly, fried shark fin with scrambled egg) and some wonderful protest ordering featuring grilled tiger and side dishes of panda.
I also finished reading 'The Slap' by Christos Tsiolkas, which was completely brilliant (but full of sex and swearing so definitely not suitable for younger readers).
Next up, my lucky dip find in the public library this week - Around The World In A Bad Mood by Rene Foss.

Day 16: spoke too soon

Uffff, oh how I repent me of my optimism yesterday, for I nearly came a cropper tonight at a retirement party for the fabulous Mrs Jacobs.
Mrs Jacobs has put many a young tyke on to the path of fame and fortune, or at least job satisfaction, in her role as careers advisor and general wisdom dispenser.
Anyhoo, I was bobbling about in a cloud of loveliness and bonhomie, reminiscing about the careers advice of my own youth (in some sort of random cupboard at school: "have you any idea what you want to be?" "A librarian." "Whatever for?") when I found it was time to tuck into the puddings and found myself filling a bowl with date cake, raspberry pavlova and a chocolate rice krispie thingy. I was almost back to my seat before I remembered, with some shame and horror, that I wasn't allowed the chocolate rice krispie thingy.
Ideally I would have then been rescued by someone, probably Professor Brian Cox OBE given his current track record of turning up at disastrous points in my life (1997 general election night*, quests to understand quarks, attempts to give up chocolate etc), flinging the door open, hollering 'nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo' in a catastrophe-averted-but-only-just-hollywood-stylee manner and consigning the evil chocolate krispie to a maybe-the-size-of-an-atom-or-maybe-the-size-of-the-universe black hole.
Sadly that didn't happen. I tried to give the evil krispie  to the person next to me, who tried the same thing with the person next to her and it did a half-orbit of the table, as no one would claim responsibility for it, and then it was hidden under a napkin.
How long until this torment is over?
4 weeks you say?
Knickers.

*I can never hear 'Things Can Only Get Better' without suddenly remembering, as I did on election night, that I needed to buy Sharon a new fish slice. I melted hers by accident on a hot pan. Sorry Sharon.

Day 15: Two weeks in - maybe I'm not completely rubbish at this

Hugemungous thanks to everyone for their moral support and for the steadily growing collection of goodies for me to take to Nepal.
By way of celebration of having survived the first two weeks and still being reasonably sane I thought I'd salute the king of chocolate-related restraint - Mr Charlie Bucket.
'Walking to school in the mornings, Charlie could see great slabs of chocolate piled up high in the shop windows, and he would stop and stare and press his nose against the glass, his mouth watering like mad. Many times a day, he would see other children taking bars of creamy chocolate out of their pockets and munching them greedily, and that, of course, was pure torture.
Only once a year, on his birthday, did Charlie Bucket ever get to taste a bit of chocolate. The whole family saved up their money for that special occasion, and when the great day arrived, Charlie was always presented with one small chocolate bar to eat all by himself. And each time he received it, on those marvellous birthday mornings, he would place it carefully in a small wooden box that he owned, and treasure it as though it were a bar of solid gold; and for the next few days, he would allow himself only to look at it, but never to touch it. Then at last, when he could stand it no longer, he would peel back a tiny bit of the paper wrapping at one corner to expose a tiny bit of chocolate, and then he would take a tiny nibble - just enough to allow the lovely sweet taste to spread out slowly over his tongue. The next day, he would take another tiny nibble, and so on, and so on. And in this way, Charlie would make his sixpenny bar of birthday chocolate last him for more than a month.'
p17-18 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl.

Day 14: Penguins for Peace (and Snail Racing for Fun and Profit)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DoHcO5GqsLk&feature=player_embedded

Have I already told you about the penguin on a plane? As discovered and shared by my lovely friend Yolande. If not, see above link. It is indeed very soothing and I'm thinking of having an emergency photo-of-penguin-on-a-stick that I can deploy in a chocolate deprived meltdown.

Other things that are cheering me up are a) Wonders of the Universe is on and Brian is up a mountain somewhere in a pair of natty mittens talking about bending time until it stops. I think someone did that during period 4 today. It went on for at least three normal human hours. I don't quite know how this was achieved as I'm not really listening properly but it sounds more complicated than the offside rule. b) I'm contemplating starting an annual snail race at school (Congham rules).

What? there's just been a bit about black holes which may be 'smaller than an atom or a billion times bigger than our sun'. Bit vague isn't it? Has Brian just worked out he lost everyone in the first 5 minutes of the programme?
It gets better, black holes are some of the 'most violent places' in the universe. Now that I can sympathise with.

c) My requested books arrived at the library. Hooray!

Day 13: A tiny bit fed up now

The novelty of the no-chocolate regime is wearing off now. I need some worthy cause to take my mind off my cravings.
Enter the World Snail Racing contest as held annually in Norfolk. It needs every vote possible to triumph in the Where Else But England favourite English events contest.
World Snail Racing needs you - go to http://whereelsebutengland.co.uk/ scroll down a bit and vote for Snail Racing. Be quick about it though, voting closes tomorrow.
Thank you!

Day 12: a bit of a cheat, sort of

Hurray and hurrah it was my birthday today so I had an temporary exemption for a few minutes and had a piece of chocolate cake. And it was fab. So there. And it doesn't even count because it's my birthday.

Day 11: No chocolate necessary

I spent the whole of today Colchester zoo, which was excellent. Nobody needs chocolate when there are penguins and condors and pygmy hippos and sun bears to look at.

Day Ten: Rubbish, with outbreaks of kindness

On balance, today was rubbish. Probably because it was a Friday and the expectation is that Fridays are fab.
It started off well though as a lovely person donated some fab books to the school library. Thank you anonymous book giver!
After that, nearly everything I did went wrong in one way or another. The cake sale I baked for was postponed, and I couldn't even cheer myself up by eating them as they were full of chocolate. Pants, pants, pants.
Luckily I was rescued by a level headed and lovely Year 12 student, who would have none of this wallowing in self-pity lark and cheered me up no end before offering to purchase one of my unwanted cakes. She then surpassed herself by turning up with not only her purse, but some friends also and, very polite girls that they are, they also bought some. And then so did the boys. And thus the illegal black market cake sale was begun. (Unless you are reading this from school, in which case it wasn't).
But hurray! there is now enough money for our  first educational poster - bring on the life cycle of the frog!

Day Nine: CSI Chocolate cake

Tomorrow is bumper cake sale day at school so I thought I'd set myself the challenge of making some chocolate cakes without being able to scoff half the mixture before it got in the oven. The first bit went reasonably well, though if anyone knows of a way of sifting cocoa without generating clouds of the stuff I'd like to know about it. Surely it's cheating to use the back of a spoon? The kitchen now looks like the Scene Of Crime Officers have been round taking fingerprints.
The cakes had the decency to rise a bit and actually look like cakes so I made a start on the icing. Step one: beat butter together with a spoonful of milk. This. Does. Not. Work. After a while I just got cross and splattered with milk so gave up and started sifting the icing sugar and cocoa in. Cue repeat of SOCO fingerprinting fiasco with added dreadful temptation just to stick my face in the bowl.
Resisted all such tempation and, having smothered cakes in the icing, set about artistically decorating them with cherries and marshmallows.
Looked at cakes, realised they didn't appear very artisitic after all and did the old 'if in doubt drizzle melted chocolate over' trick.
Got about 30 gallons of melted chocolate over my hands and had to clamp my jaws shut and plunge my hands into the washing up water before disaster struck.
Next time, I'll make non-chocolatey ones.

Day Eight: foggy, but not foggy enough...

...I still saw the chocolate covered coffee beans in Julian Graves, and found myself standing at the till with them. Now they are sitting in the kitchen making me feel guilty. I need an excuse for having bought them.
Or maybe I could just hide them. No one need know.
Yes, I'll hide them, and if they are found, I'll say they are a surprise present for someone.
Me probably.

I even got past Muffin Break unscathed, though I did pause by the chocolate mud cake and inhaled so hard I nearly fainted.

Day Seven: one week down

Well, it's not going too badly, if you don't count the fact that I've discovered eight new grey hairs this week, wished two people a nice weekend this morning (got a bit of a shock when I found it wasn't Friday yet) and almost ended up hiding under a desk yesterday when I was outwitted by our 400 year old photocopier.
On the plus side I found a terrific source of educational posters today and am really excited about buying some to take to Nepal. Also, I've had a cup of tea, and that's made everything better.

Day Six: A ripple in the probability of the jelly

A highly successful day and no mistake.
1. I have still not eaten any chocolate, hurrah!
2. I had a fab phone call with Dr Metters of Nepal Schools Aid fame.
3. I managed to text and answer to Radio Norfolk's 'Rural Riddle', even though I didn't hear what it was (too busy on the phone to Brian).
4. I confirmed my theory that particle physics is the new poetry.
5. I have discovered that Professors are getting younger.

I have just returned from another lecture on the Large Hadron Collider. That's 2 (two) in less than a week. This was given by Professor Ben Allanach of the University of Cambridge, who looked about 22 years old or something (see 5. above) and, much like Professor Brian Cox was warm, witty and tremendously excited about the whole LHC thing. He lost me after the first 30 seconds or so, but there was definitely a mention of trifle.
Much like poetry, I haven't got a clue what most of physics is about, but there are some excellent words (anti bottom quarks anyone?),  and I like all the creativity and imagination (see 4. above). There do seem to be quite a lot of invisible things, that might or might not be there. And possibly some dark matter that isn't as dark as other dark matter (beige? diet dark matter?).
Also, I avoided a plate of highly enticing bourbon biscuits (see 1. above). A triumph.

Day Five

What? Is it only day five?
Sob.

Day Four: Spring Has Sprung

Lovely sunny day for most of the UK, except where it was snowing.
I seem to be better at giving up chocolate than remembering to update my blog. I blame the DI Frost books, too gripping to put down for long.
So, the tactic for today was to escape the jar of Nutella, which I could hear calling plaintively from the kitchen cupboard. As it was so nice outside I went into town. I started off well, taking some of my World Book Night books to the YMCA but then I ended up buying a frock. And then a load of other stuff which was all heavy and needed to be taken home. So I did that and then somehow ended up back in town doing the same thing all over again.
I hadn't realised giving up chocolate would be so expensive.
The third excursion of the day was an evening safari in Hatfield Forest where there were deer, bats, and birds aplenty. And mercifully the shop and cafe were shut.

Day Three: Earthquakes and Tsunamis

Got up. Put the news on. Discovered it wasn't a day to be whinging about chocolate.

Day Two: Prof Brian Cox OBE has scrambled my brain.

And disappointed me greatly to boot.
I thought I'd try distraction techniques to stop thinking about chocolate and, having only passed GCSE science due to the brilliance of Mr Johnson's explanations of the laws of physics in terms of Aston Villa analogies, decided the mysteries of the universe were the ideal topic. To London then, for the 9th Douglas Adams Memorial Lecture, to revel in the wisdomosity of Professor Cox.
Sadly, my feeble chocolate-deprived brain could not cope with all this boggling science stuff, but never mind, it was all hugely entertaining, and funny, and beautiful, even when it was being a bit complicated and bothersome. The Large Hadron Collider, even if I still don't get it, is enough to restore anyone's faith in humanity and there is a chocolate-esque glow of loveliness about how well it's all going and how happy and excited the scientists are (see http://www.lhc.ac.uk/)
But then it went a bit pear shaped. The universe, despite being really quite big already, is still expanding. A trifle unnecessary, I think, but there you go. A nice lady from the audience asked what it is that the universe is expanding into. At which point I envisaged a sort of Kinder Surprise type set up with Earth rattling around inside it somewhere, then some space with galaxies and stuff stretching away to meet a layer or two of chocolate. Is that too much to ask? Apparently it is. It's not expanding into anything. It's just expanding. There's nothing there. Less than nothing. Not even anything for there to be nothing in.
How rubbish is that?
Professor Cox, or other learned science bod, if you are reading this - and there's no reason at all why you should - and I've got this all wrong, please post the right answer. (References to Aston Villa are optional, but helpful. Presence of chocolate is highly desirable). Thank you.

Day One - Maybe I've been a bit optimistic

Here's how Day One panned out:

6.40am: feel quite smug, having employed the tactic of eating too many Nutella-filled pancakes last night. I cannot possibly face any chocolate for a fortnight at least. This is going to be easy peasy.

11am: suddenly find myself wishing I'd bought a chocolate flake cake on the way to work. Nooooooo, my Nutella-overdose shield has crumbled already!

11.30am: accompany lovely 6th formers to an Ash Wednesday service - leave feeling full of determination and commitment.

2.40pm: place very handsome collection box in the staff room for people to put items in, walk round the corner and set eyes on the dazzling new drinks machine. Immediately forget the no-chocolate rule. I'm almost lured in to an accidental (hot) chocolate consumption situation but am saved by the fact that I'm quite nosy and want to find out if it can make the 'tea' option taste anything like tea.

5pm: launch mission to find some crayons to take to Nepal. Find myself trapped in a pincer movement between Muffin Break and Thornton's chocolates. Scurry past, probably looking like a shoplifter, and make it home. Discover to my horror that I've left my current read 'A Touch of Frost' at work. Sulk a bit. Blame it all on the lack of chocolate and have a cup of tea instead. Sulk a bit more.