get your cupcakes - get your cupcakes here

How often do you look at someone doing a different job and think, 'I could do that. I'd be good at that. Why am I wasting my life away teaching when I could be a train driver... a traffic warden... a park keeper... yes, I have had occasion to envy each of these professions - don't judge me - and today I am a cupcake seller. I love it.

It's not my first time. I've helped a friend on and off with his american cookies and cupcakes business. When he's overstretched and can't be in three places at once I help him out. I also spent a glorious part of my life working night shift in a Tim Hortons coffee shop. That was the best time of my life - no question.

Don't get me wrong, I love teaching; but sometimes it's easy to get a little jaded. Sometimes the pressures involved take a little shine off it. Sometimes it's easy to feel underappreciated and unloved. Selling baked goods just makes me happy. People like you when you sell them cupcakes. They smile when they see you; they are genuinely happy you exist in their lives. I'm not sure that can be said of all my pupils as a teacher. I love the cut and thrust - the banter - the twinkle in the eye - a bit of charm - a bit of a flirt (I can't be doing that as a teacher either) - give the customer a smile and an extra cookie thrown in, since they've been so nice.

I should probably come clean at this point and admit that, personally, I don't even like cupcakes. They are generally a sickly waste of the planets resources. They have no reason to exist (Though it has to be said that my friend, Nathan's, cupcakes are a pretty special waste of Earth's resources - truly the lightest, fluffiest, smoothest tasting waste available.) But do you have to like something to sell it? I certainly don't have to like silly iced pieces of fluff (sorry Nathan, delicious silly iced pieces of fluff) to have a great time selling cupcakes. I'd hate to think how miserable it would be to teach a subject I didn't love myself. There are teachers out there - teaching subjects they have no love for. I am so incredibly lucky to love what I teach.

Could I really leave education to sell cupcakes or donuts full time? No, of course not. I would soon get bored. I'd miss the dramas and challenges of the classroom too much. But for today I am not a teacher - I am a purveyor of cupcakes. So if you happen to be in Coleraine and feel the urge for a little drop of sugary happiness, come and say hello.

the narrow path to the super highway

It's an image thing I know, but I like to see myself as someone who travels the path less trod when it comes to popular culture. I always have done. Aged ten I was in a primary school surrounded by Manchester United and Liverpool football fans - so I support Newcastle United. In secondary school all my friends supported the Ulster rugby team - I chose to follow London Irish instead. At university I started watching a new american sitcom, rather uninspiringly called 'Friends.' I quite liked it, until everyone seemed to be watching it and I lost interest. The same thing happened with the West Wing, and so on and so on.

And now I'm in a quandary. I was browsing the shelves of my local second hand book school when I happened upon a little orange paperback that looked like it hadn't been read at all. Intrigued I took a quick scan, checked the blurb, and eventually bought it thinking I might have found another hidden gem.

A few days later my sister was talking to me when she spotted the book lying on my desk. "Ah" she said, "You're reading 'One Day'"
"I haven't started it yet. Have you heard of it then?"

And so it turns out that my little orange paperback is not so much a hidden gem as a glittering jewel that's been on display in a national museum for the past two years. It has been extensively reviewd and garnered mainly positive write ups. It was the best selling british novel in 2010 and has sold over a million copies. According to the Times "it is only a matter of time before you read 'One Day'" And to make matters worse a screenplay version of it has just opened in the cinemas this week.

How can I be so far behind the Zeitgeist? You've all heard of it - so how have I missed it? When did I wander off my little less trod path and veer onto the slip road for the M1?

So you see my dilemma. Do I ignore my image issues and become the 60,141st person to read it this week; or do I return it, spine unbroken, to a little secondhand bookshop somewhere. Dammit! That's already been done!