Most of these pass me by, but there is one I felt the need to support: MS Awareness Week. My dad and uncle both have MS and it felt amiss to let the week go by without raising some money or spreading the word a little bit. Not many people know very much about MS – I know I didn’t know much before my dad was diagnosed – but it’s really important to try and make people understand.

The theme of this week’s MS Awareness Week was ‘blue’. So we held a blue cake sale. I’m not sure that’s quite what the organisers of the week had in mind – blue isn’t a natural colour in the world of food, seeing as its most often associated with mould, the scourge of good food, but we tried our best anyway.

My lovely work friends made the most amazing mixture of cakes – there was a lovely cheesecake, a delicious sponge cake and lots of different delectable cupcakes. They were all very tasty – I should know, I put the research in – and we managed to raise £70 for the charity. I was aiming for £20, so I was incredibly chuffed. A big thanks to everyone who made cakes or donated money – I was really touched.

I’ll take this opportunity to include a few facts about MS here – that way, if you’re unsure about what the condition is, you will have more of an idea by the end of this blog. Thank you in advance for reading:

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a neurological condition which affects around 100,000 people in the UK.

No one knows the cause and there is no cure – but research is progressing fast.

I have a cold. I use that word, but I’m not sure it quite sums it up, so I may change it: I have a mother of a cold. I managed to get through the entire of winter without one – I didn’t have so much as a sniffle, despite all the snow, grotty weather and sub-minus temperatures. Instead, my cold waits until a weekend when we have a bank holiday. And not just any bank holiday – possibly the only bank holiday in living memory that has been sunny. My Facebook and Instagram feeds were full of beautiful images of people at the seaside, having barbecues in gardens with freshly mown grass, eating ice creams full of smiles. I was not full of smiles. I was full of cold.

I don’t get a cold that often. But when I do, it sucker punches me. It gets right in my eyes, so whereas most people use colds as an excuse to watch bad daytime TV, I am forced to sit in a dark room, until such a time that my eyes decide to stop streaming. I’m basically like one of the mice in Shrek, wearing dark glasses indoors and repeatedly bumping into things.

I’m not very good at being ill, because I find it boring. I knew I was coming down with something on our last day in Belfast (more on this soon). I started to feel a bit spaced out, with a headache I couldn’t shift. I downed water and herbal tea, took tablets straightaway, but all no avail. The cold was coming and there was nothing I could do about it.

The only positive thing about being ill is that it brings out the best in Mort. I’m writing this under a blanket, with him curled up underneath my arm. He’s barely left my side in the past two days.

When we picked him up from my parents, he made a beeline for me, letting me pick him up and immediately snuggling me, and falling asleep. When we got home, he sat with me all night. He seemed to know I was going to be really poorly before I did – I woke up determined to fight against the cold on Monday morning, and proceeded to charge around the house, trying to do housework and unpack. Mort patiently followed me everywhere, watching me. He followed me outside, he followed me upstairs, he followed me to the kitchen. And then he followed me when I finally gave in and admitted I was ill. He sat with me as I napped for about three hours, not making a sound. After an awful nights sleep, I didn’t get out of bed until 11am this morning – he patiently lay in a patch of sun until I woke up. And when Dan got home, we all went for a walk, hoping that some fresh air would do me good. We took Mort to his favourite spot, so he could run around with Dan – but he refused to run far away from me, always running back quickly to check I was ok.

I know sometimes I moan about him. That his barking has been known to drive me up the wall. And that he has occasionally embarrassed me in public. But he’s the best friend I could ask for. He knew I was ill before I really did, and he stayed with me, knowing that eventually it would hit me. And when it did hit me, he was there.

When it’s not tense, it’s shouty. When it’s not shouty, it’s sweary. Our neighbours have been treated to several things this evening; they know now, beyond any doubt, exactly which football team Dan supports. They’ve also been treated to a comprehensive swearing lesson.

Aston Villa have so far scored twice (which I think, if my memory serves me correctly, is two goals more than what they’ve scored in the entire rest of the season). Every time they score, this is what my neighbours probably hear:

A loud thump, following by a primeval bellow.
Lots of footsteps, as Dan excitedly runs around the entire ground floor of our home.
More tiny footsteps, accompanied by loud barks, as Mort chases him.
More barks, as Dan picks Mort up, and jumps around with him.

And, if they listen very closely, they may be able to hear a little sigh and a female voice saying: “Give me strength….”

To avoid disturbing instances such as these, I believe some modern, artistic types, decided it was time to introduce a wider array of prints for people to adorn their homes with. Typography is all important; these prints are your chance to say: “Come into my home! See how trendy and witty I am – prepare to like me even more!” Not mine. Mine say: “I spend far too much money on things I could probably draw myself.” They provide a little glimpse into your psyche. For instance, my choices reveal that I like dogs, horses kicking balls and New York. Sometimes, I’m glad that Freud is dead, and not readily available to analyse things….

However, these beautiful things come at a price. Usually a big one. For a while, I lusted after a print that simply said, in massive pink letters: DRINK MORE GIN. Note the capitals – it was quite adamant that you should drink more gin. However, I realised that I wouldn’t be able to afford any gin, let alone more, should I purchase this print, which seemed a bit ridiculous. So I listened to the words on the print closely. Which, unfortunately for the print, meant leaving it on the shelf. Oh, the cruel irony.

So imagine my excitement at Blists Hill last week when I stumbled into their print shop and realised that most of the prints were 50p. Yes, that’s right. 50p. You can’t even buy a chocolate bar for 50p any more! Don’t get me started on that though – that’s another blog, and it ain’t a short one.

So I went a bit mad. Or, as mad as you can go, when everything in the room costs 50p. I don’t think £2.50 is most women’s idea of a mad time in a shop, but it certainly felt exciting.

Here are my new prints – I can’t really explain what drew me towards them, except perhaps a love of randomness. And noses.

It’s a particularly dog friendly spot; we park up at British Camp, which is conveniently next to a fantastic dog friendly pub called The Malvern Hills Hotel. I knew it was the place for us when I read a review that described it as ‘more dog friendly than child friendly’. And it was perfect – we had big crusty baguettes for lunch, sat outside with a happy sausage dog, exhausted from his bout of insanity at the top of a big hill.

The view at the top of Malverns is nothing short of breathtaking. You can truly take in what a beautiful country we’re lucky enough to live in – you’re at such a height, you get a similar view to one you would get in a plane. You can see where patches of land are bathed in sunlight, and where gloomy rainclouds are treating an isolated area to a good wash. The fields look like a glorious patchwork quilt and you stand at the top, hugging yourself, so grateful to live in such a picture-book perfect place.

Mort ran around like something demented, rejoicing in the gusts of wind that force his ears to flip back. He refused to walk, pulling us up the hill, galloping everywhere at breakneck speed.

He is always full of life at the top of the Malverns. Seeing him so happy, together with the beautiful views, always makes me feel truly alive too.

However, I’m going to make one exception to the rule. Because this week I had some amazing news.

I edit a magazine called #studentfarmer. It’s put together by me and one designer and the first edition was launched in September. It was only ever supposed to be a one-off, but people liked it so much that we decided to put a new edition together for every new university term. There have now been three editions – it’s all still very new but one things for certain; this magazine is my baby. I work on two other magazines and both are precious to me in different ways, but this one is all mine. I put it together, piece by piece, completely from scratch.

I have always, always loved magazines. Ever since they turned The Animals of Farthing Wood from a TV series into a magazine, I’ve been utterly hooked. I spend a small fortune on magazines every month and I refuse to throw most of them away. I gravitate towards them; if there is a magazine in a room, I can’t help but flick through it, and I look forward to my favourite titles arriving in the post every month like a child waits for Santa. Nothing makes me happier than hearing that heavy thud on the doormat.

This week, I found out that my little magazine has been shortlisted for the PPA ‘Front Cover of the Year’ award. This is huge – the other titles include magazines such as Cosmopolitan, Elle and Tatler. For us to included in the same league is utterly incredible. I’ve looked up to those magazines for years, so this feels, without sounding cheesy, like a bit of a dream.

There’s no denying we’re the underdog. For heavens sake – we’re up against a half-naked David Beckham, a leather-clad Holly Willoughby and the Queen. One’s hot, one is really hot, and the other is David Beckham. But we want to give the big names a run for their money. The other magazines all have huge teams and big budgets. Two people put the #studentfarmer cover together, and it didn’t cost them a penny. Those are my wellies in the picture. I wrote some of those coverlines by hand.

If you could all vote for me, I would be so incredibly grateful. You can vote every day (if you want to) and from every device (computers, tablets, phones – they all count as separate votes). You can even share it on Twitter/Facebook if you’re feeling especially lovely. We have until 24 May to get as many votes as possible, so if you could vote as many times as you possibly can, that would be amazing. In return, I will get Mort to do some kind of dance for you. I’ll teach him Riverdance, if I have to. Here is the link – I know it’s difficult, but try not to get distracted by David Beckham’s body (I’ve been there – I nearly voted for that magazine myself).

We probably don’t stand much of a chance. But, for once, wouldn’t it be nice for the underdog to win? I feel very much like the pig in the film Babe – no one thinks for a second we will win and beat the collies at their own game. But we’re going to give it all we’ve got.

That’ll do pig.

Shakespeare has loomed especially large in my life because he’s my homeboy. I’m lucky enough to live just down the road from Stratford-upon-Avon, so I can’t ever remember a time when his works weren’t a part of my life. My favourite dog walk goes past the church in which he is buried, I’ve been in his birthplace more times than I care to remember and my toes have been trod on numerous times by enthusiastic tourists.

I couldn’t even begin to tell you what an important influence he has been. Lots of people talk about Shakespeare like they talk about The Beatles, insisting he’s the best because he did everything first. Well, I’m sure he’d love everyone to think that, but the truth is that he nicked stuff left, right and centre. Shakespeare was a massive tea-leaf; mythology, Greek legends, the Bible, other playwrights. You name it, he swiped it. But it doesn’t matter – he may not have done it first, but he arguably did it the best.

What that man could do with words is unbelievable. And that’s what makes him truly great – yes, the stories are fantastic, but, in my humble opinion, that’s not what makes him the best of the best. Who doesn’t know a Shakespeare quote? They are part of our everyday language, and what better plaudit is there for a writer than that? Not only did he take the English language and show it a good time, he also changed it permanently.

I believe there is a Shakespeare play designed to hold a special place in everyone’s heart. If you disagree with me, it just means you haven’t found yours yet. I remember the first time I went to the Royal Shakespeare Theatre; my (very thoughtful) friend Kat bought us tickets to Much Ado About Nothing and it was nothing short of incredible. We laughed the whole way through it and I realised that my teachers were right when they told us the plays were designed to be seen, not read. It starred Gary Waldhorn and I still remember how his acting blew me away. Fast forward a few years and I was lucky enough to see Dame Judi Dench in All’s Well that Ends Well – I’m a big fan of The Dench, so it was all I could do not to wet myself when she appeared on stage.

But I think the play that sticks out the most is the one that happened accidentally; the one I didn’t really know anything about. And that’s saying a lot; I did an entire module on Shakespeare at university, which was an eight-week whistle-stop tour of the majority of his plays. I went to see King John with my sister because they were selling the tickets for £5, so it’s fair to say I didn’t have particularly high hopes.

But oh Lordy. If you had come to me at the end of that performance and asked me if I’d like to watch the entire thing again, immediately, with no toilet breaks, I would have said yes without hesitation. I probably would have told you off for even wasting time asking the question. Everything about it was unexpected and breathtaking; the actors gave you goosebumps with their and there were surprises at every turn. Let’s just say its the first Shakespeare play I’ve seen where the entire cast dance along to Dirty Dancing’s I’ve Had The Time Of My Life. And, in my opinion, the others are the poorer for it. It shouldn’t have worked – but it completely, one hundred per cent did.

And that, in a nutshell, is why Shakespeare is so famous. That’s why we still sit on the edge of our seats in theatres, make notes in the margins in battered old copies of Macbeth and visit Stratford-upon-Avon in droves.

Because he still gets us. He still knows what falling in love feels like, how regret can tear apart your soul and how death is a sweeping tidal wave of pain. He’s still current; he still speaks to us.

And everyday, in our speech, we use the words and phrases he gave us. Think you don’t like Shakespeare? Think again – you’re the ventriloquist dummy to his puppet master. He’s still the ultimate wordsmith – and he probably always will be.

As we left the pub, with the sweet shop in our sights, a man suddenly stuck his head out the window and shouted: “Is that a quality dog?!”

To start with I was slightly concerned he was talking about me, but his gaze was fixed very determinedly on Mort. “Bring him in! We’ve got something for him!” I warned him that Mort would probably bark and he replied in a way no one ever has before: “Even better!”

What happened next was so incredibly funny and bizarre that I will remember it forever. I can’t watch the video my sister recorded without giggling and I will apologise in advance, because the song they sang to Mortimer will stay in your head for at least three days.

After four and a half years of loving every little bit of Mort, but silently wishing that he could learn to express himself in a way that doesn’t involve his high-pitched, quick off the mark, bellowing bark, I was made to eat my words. It would appear that our sausage-shaped little fellow is a talented barker and one with a fantastic sense of comedy timing. After the song finished, one woman even said to me: “How did you train him to do that?” Believe me, people have asked me many questions about Mort, but that was a first.

To see the video in question, head over to my Facebook page and watch my little man in action. Altogether now: “Oh, what a quality dog….”

But on Friday, I realised that truly dog-friendly places do exist. And one of these places is Ironbridge – specifically Blists Hill. Ironbridge, for all the geography fans it there, is situated near Telford, and it’s famous because it is credited with being the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution. The bridge was the first of its kind to be made from cast iron, and it’s one of the few that still survives today.

I have very vivid memories of a school trip to Ironbridge and, specifically, Blists Hill; a Victorian town where you can explore traditional Victorian shops such as a pharmacy, a sweet shop and a bakers, and learn more about the era. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that dogs were allowed inside Blists Hill and although they couldn’t go in the shops, you could walk around with them.

It turns out this isn’t true-as we stood outside the first shop, the man inside beckoned us in and insisted we bring Mort with us. It turns out that they are happy for dogs to enter the buildings that don’t serve food – more than happy, in fact – everyone beamed when they spotted Mort. I usually apologised in advance and warned them he tends to bark at strangers, but they couldn’t have been more understanding if they tried – most admired him from a distance, others gave him a tentative stroke but didn’t take it personally if he decided to bark in their face.

It was such a fantastic day. We bought freshly baked bread from the bakers to take home, had a drink in the pub, ate fish and chips with our fingers in the sunshine, introduced Mort to a shire horse, walked round the funfair and got some bargain prints made on site to take home.

I’ll admit, there were times when I thought taking Mort might have been a huge mistake. When I overheard that 350 children were visiting that day, a large part of me contemplated making a run for it. There was also a low point when we had to walk through a few dark rooms, showing loud, large films about the history of the site – Mort clinged to me in fear, and I thought for a second it might have been kinder to leave him at home. But he had a fantastic day – everyone adored him, he hoovered up dropped chips on every path and he was treated to some ice cream. He’s very good at letting you know when he’s happy, because he walks with a bounce, his tail wagging in the breeze – he did that a lot, so I think it’s safe to say that he was a big fan of Blists Hill. Or at least a big fan of small children dropping lots of chips on the floor.

I couldn’t recommend it more. Actually I could, and for a very good reason, but that reason deserves a blog post of its own. Stay tuned for something amazing – but, for now, here are some pictures of our day at Blists Hill. If you have a dog, definitely plan to visit soon – I know we will be returning as soon as possible!

But seriously, having a busy week at work is nothing to complain about. The world has had a pretty horrific week. The Boston marathon bombings had me staring at my television screen with a wide-open mouth. The photos that have emerged are truly shocking and the stories horrific. How someone could do something so evil and cowardly, to innocent people, is utterly beyond me. And then you have the snowballing situation in North Korea, which seems to revolve around a dangerous little man, eager to make his mark on world, no matter the consequences even to his own people, most probably because he has a flimsy (at best) awareness of reality. Closer to home, you have Margaret Thatcher’s funeral, which went off largely without a hitch, although there were a handful of people who had nothing better to do with their time than boo a coffin containing an elderly lady. All in all, the reputation of humanity has taken a bit of a beating this week.

But it’s not all bad. Even where there is madness and terror, there is hope. The amazing people who helped the injured in Boston prove that. And that’s the bit I choose to focus on. Life is a wonderful thing – and it’s important to live it, because you never know when the rug will be pulled out from underneath your feet.

With that in mind, I wanted to share these lovely photos. Julian Becker and Max (the enormous dog) are best friends. Their dad is a US naval officer at sea, so everyday Julian’s mum takes a picture of the pair to send to him.

And that’s what it’s all about. Love and fun – preferably with your best friend.

Photo by Stasha Becker/Rex Features