Five things you possibly didn’t know about me…

As part of my brilliant blogging group we have been inspired by our Yvonne ‘The’ Bed and Breakfast Coach to blog about things people don’t know about you… or well me… As a coach I often share examples of my life to my clients but this is more than that.

Here we go…

1.  Tenuous Claim to Fame
Upon leaving school I didn’t have a plan about my career.  Until I saw that a friend of my mum’s was grooming dogs, and I thought ‘I could do that’. So that is what I did.  After my training my first ever job was for Peter’s Posh Pets on of the best shops in the UK.  It took me two hours to get there each day and at first cost more for my weekly ticket, than I got paid.  To this day, that job still holds some of my favourite memories and Peter was the kindest and all time best boss;  we just had so much fun.  You’d be amazed at how you can laugh even when you’ve been pooped upon!
The shop was (and still is) behind Olympia and therefore we had a number of ‘high profile’ clients; royalty, celebrities, writers, foreign nationals this list goes on.  As I was all of 17 I didn’t really know many of these, but when this dog walked in – I ‘knew’ him!  I was very good at grooming poodles, even my boss would allow me to groom the ‘Peter Only’ dogs (Oh the glory!) – I was allowed to groom this dog – ME!  Now you have to remember this was the late 80’s and the most famous dog on the TV was… Roly from Eastenders!  That was my handy work on the telly!  Mine!  My claim to fame is that I used to groom Roly from Eastenders – I had a client on the TV!

2.  I Travelled ‘around’ the World
When I was 21 I finally convinced one of my friends to go travelling with me.  This is without doubt the best education I could have given myself.  We travelled throughout the states, Canada, Fiji, New Zealand, Australia, Hong Kong, and Thailand. When I left home I was a girl who was sure she wasn’t bright enough to get a degree – school wasn’t my forte; I like to ‘chat’ and have fun – that didn’t work too well in school.
No one from our family had gone to into further education and certainly not ‘University’.  Yet while amongst the many characters you meet, I met many travellers on their ‘gap’ year.  This was when it became clear that these people were in fact no different to me!  In fact, what I found, was that they were, at times, rather dull and really didn’t have much to say for themselves.  Unlike me.  After a year of meeting these ‘educated’ people I came home to realise that this education ‘lark’ was something that I could do; but more than that, I could really enjoy.  One Access course and One BSc (Hons.) Psychology and Communication Degree later, here I am. Educated and still having a lot to say for myself.

3.  I ‘lived’ in the Cayman Islands
When I was a groomer I saw an advert in Dog World asking for a groomer to come out and live and work there.  As I had just got back from travelling this was too good to be true!  So I went.  It is a very beautiful island and I will cherish my memories of it.  But I worked for the most ignorant Englishman I have ever met.  He and because of his forceful nature, his family, were living an English life against the background of the Caymanian way.  It was very uncomfortable for me.  He didn’t like local people and he was unkind.  I came home after 3 months.  I learnt so much but mostly, sometimes you just don’t know till you try…

4.  I did a crazy thing to hitch a lift
Whilst travelling through New Zealand, my best friend Laura and I decided to try hitch-hiking.  We had heard that it was safe and easy to hitch your way around the two islands or as it is known there , to ‘ticky tour’.  So this is what we did.  Oh we had such a blast; we were two innocent(ish) gorgeous and fun girls and so we were given great treatment. We got to stay and work in a stables for free food and board, we got to see a deer farm on this little truck over the rolling green lush that is New Zealand and we just fell in love with the country from the inside out, we truly did.
We were getting rather confident about this and so when we didn’t get a lift for a while, (half hour on a road side with a large back pack can feel like a long time) there really weren’t that many cars on the road back then (more sheep…) I had to do something…  As a sheep truck approached I decided that best thing would be to lay in the road so it had (gulp) to stop…  thankfully in hind sight we were in a long stretch of road (side note:  as I type ‘Sydney’ has come on the radio and taken me back to being there!) and he could see me way back and managed to stop.  Just to give you an idea of the size of these trucks, sheep trucks were double trucks full of sheep and they take some time to stop.  As I write this as a 42 year old and I am struck dumb with what I did when I was half my age!  As was the driver.  But he did!

5. I ran the London Marathon through being lied to… I am rather gullible…
I clearly did know I ran, as I have the medal to show it – but as part of my training my partner in pain was my sister in law.  As an actress she used her skills in ‘lying’ to convince me that we weren’t running far.  Honestly, to this day I can’t believe how gullible I was and still be.  Whilst training on one of her days planning, I would ask her how far we were going to run? She would reply ‘Oh 12 miles’ which after some months of training I could do (not now…) so off we would trot around the Hertfordshire countryside and then we would finish finally (“come on just one more corner Kel”) and she would then ask me ‘How far do you think you ran? ‘er… you said 12 miles?!’ “15 today!” she would reply, as if it was a 15 minute run compared to a 12.  It used to leave me with such a weird feeling of awww you little fibber! but then the pride in myself took over… oh yeah baby I ran 15 miles – get me!  Fibbing got me to run further and further and I thank her for that.  She thanks me for being such a stubborn old bag she had to learn to stand up for herself – she is one feisty bird!

A further five will be coming soon…