My draughty attic bedroom on Regent Street was piled high with flower power Joni Mitchell and Bob Dylan cassettes and plastered with wacky Salvador Dali posters. And I loved John Lennon. They were happy days – but not without a care.

I had quite a heart warming flashback other day when circa 20 years on, living as a considerably better dressed carnivore in Ingatestone, a displaced but not unwelcome CND flyer landed on my doormat. As the red-ink headlines ‘Scrap Trident’ shouted out at me from the leaflet, I was transported back to a Camel Lights smoke-hazed era and it led me to realise how the world has – and hasn’t – changed.

During my student days under the Thatcher government I was an ardent supporter of CND – the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. I’m ashamed to say that I didn’t know that they still existed until last week. I’m ashamed to admit that I thought CND had fizzled out with the Cold War and the peace sign had found a new home as a fashion logo on Top Shop t-shirts.

Back in the early nineties, we lived in the shadow of a Cold War when nuclear weapons were strategically tested and ‘super powers’ pointed them across the globe. The Iron Lady spent gazillions on Trident warheads and said: ‘A world without nuclear weapons would be less stable and more dangerous for all of us,’ which freaked us out. Headstrong women held fort at Greenham Common until the cruise missiles they so stridently opposed were removed in the early noughties. In short, we were all scared out of our wits by the ‘n’ word.

Years later we are much more comfortable with the word ‘nuclear’ and we accept its presence as energy sources dwindle with stations popping up around the UK. But CND  is still around and has a purpose. There are still plans to upgrade trident submarines and CND campaign against the loss of civilian life by armed drones. We were worried that Thatcher pushed the boundaries of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, but now India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea aren’t even in it. I suppose you can say the little flyer on my doormat did its job and made me think about CND past and present.

Just an aside – do you know how the CND peace sign with the three lines within a circle came about? British artist Gerald Holtom designed it in 1958. The lines are derived from semaphore flag signalling – two lines down at 45 degrees for ‘N’ and a straight line up and down for ‘D’ for nuclear disarmament.

When I first announced my idea to girlfriends last December my proposed new year’s resolution was met with laughter, shock and disapproval. My shopaholic sister physically baulked with disbelief. One friend is so determined that I’ll fail that he has put money on it. I have to say I have had serious self-doubt and a near-wobble in the January sales. But two months on I feel quite virtuous and a little less poor.

It’s been a hard habit to break – I love clothes and I adore the High Street (Top Shop, Miss Selfridge, River Island and especially Reiss), not to mention the whole stratosphere of equestrian fashion. But years of clothes shopping have left me with a wardrobe (or three) packed with samey, badly finished garments – mostly black – and fads that have come and gone before you can say Victoria Beckham. Who really thought that bat wing jumpers and leggings would last? They were bad enough the first time around.

I’m hoping my year in denial is also helping me reflect on my post-forty fashion identity. Until now, I have been bloody-minded about visits to Top Shop. With sheer determination, I have continued taking trips to my favourite fashion Mecca regardless of age, squeezing myself into skinny jeans and forcing my size seven feet into tiny pumps like a possessed ugly sister.

But when I return from my retail fasting in a year’s time will I feel even older and get walked off the premises by the fashion police for being ‘over age’? The thought of stepping across the age-fashion threshold to Per Una and Next feels me with fear and dread. Classic cuts, slacks, frocks and pastels. No thanks!

Working at home means I live in casual clothes (unless I have a Skype conference call or Google Hangout where I might smarten up my top half).  So, I don’t have the daily wardrobe dilemmas of an office girl and I have to admit there’s quite a smooth transition from jodhpurs to pyjamas some/most days. I don’t really need new clothes.

Thank you Sue Waymark for your inspiring idea – I’m afraid there’ll be no visits to Clarks Village Outlet this year for me.

But then came along the Pistorius case and media circus backed its metaphorical bags and headed to the Southern Hemisphere for some ‘no holds barred’ story telling.

The murder story aside, the hearing itself has provided prime cuts of news fodder. And I’m not talking about horse burgers any more. Here in the UK, contempt of court laws for a fair and balanced trial would quash any pre-verdict press speculation. With preliminary or committal hearings in a magistrate’s court only the skeletal facts can be reported. Even less under the Children and Young Persons Act and when a victim’s identification needs to be protected.

Over in Pretoria, it’s literally a different case. The scene during the bail hearing is a disorganised courtroom with family members mingling, camera crews fighting for space and reporters filing from their videophones. Where is the hammer? Order, ORDER! All the facts are reported making it an international ‘whodunnit’ case. The bail hearing is slowly becoming a courtroom drama.

The added twist to the tale is that it is the fall of a sporting legend – a super hero Paralympic icon to boot. Philandering footballers, match fixing cricketers, chemically enhanced cyclists – they all sell papers.

Back in 1995, the US televised OJ Simpson murder case, gave TV soap operas a run for their money with nearly a year of coverage of the case. In the same vein as the OJ case – guilty or not – Pistorius will hire a defence team who will be able to hold court for many months.

And how long before Hollywood hooks into this impending saga – Oscar Pistorius: The Movie…

We made the usual small talk about inconsequential stuff and the ex-judge asked where I was from. When I mentioned proudly that I was from Essex, my words were greeted with a rip-roaring belly laugh. I might as well have said that I was an alien from Mars. I was totally shocked and was made to feel very small. Luckily an embarrassed and apologetic relative shuffled me off quickly to the nearest tray of canapés.

The short incident left me thinking what the sentence would have been during his career for the ‘Essex boy or girl’ in the dock with such prejudice and snobbery – a slightly worrying thought. Imagine the harsh prison sentences for petty crimes by Essex offenders – ‘life’ for shoplifting!

After the wedding weekend, all thoughts of the conversation were erased when I went for a hack across the rolling Essex countryside in the sunshine my friend Collette. We were able to admire the beauty of the landscape that Constable chose to paint while I let off steam about my wedding encounter.

A few years on it looks like BBC Four are giving Essex some long-awaited positive press with a new documentary called The Joys of Essex. The programme explores the county’s rich culture, beautiful architecture and social history – rather than the usual spray tans and cosmetic surgery for which we have become renowned.

I hope it shows some of the glorious rural landscapes that I’ve had the pleasure of exploring on hacks with my horses and friends. And let’s hope Mr. Judgemental is watching!

The Sunday Times sports correspondent on the phone line, David Walsh, was recounting how the paper was dragged through the libel mill by Armstrong who ‘as good as’ defeated the paper. They paid £300,000 in an out of court settlement and the same again for their own expenses after they referred to L.A. Confidentiel: Les Secrets de Lance Armstrong, the book he co-wrote with French sports journo.

The reporter had a hunch about Armstrong all along based on scepticism by French sports journalists who were in the know about cycling and ‘The Tour’ (read his excellent article: Lance Armstrong: Drugs, denials and me). His newspaper article headlines also included ‘Saddled with suspicion’ and ‘Paradise lost on tour’.

I think the recent Leveson Inquiry, that is based on well-founded horror about phone hacking, has also sadly made the public question the investigative work of good journalists who are there to uncover the truth.

Many brilliant reporters, like David Walsh, put themselves on the line for a cause and pursue years of research. It’s easy to forget that reporting is primarily ‘in the public interest’, not to cause public outrage.

In the Armstrong case this is the ‘interest’ of athletes and teams that have been through the gruelling regime of the Tour De France, only to miss out on the number one spot when he took the title seven times.

It was a bright Saturday afternoon at my mare Eve’s stables in Roxwell, Essex, when yard manager Andrea popped her head over the stable door and asked if Nick and I would like to be snapped in a calendar photo shoot.

We volunteered without hesitation when we found out that every penny of the project goes to cancer charities Cancer Research UK, Macmillan Cancer Support and Farleigh Hospice.

We were introduced to the photographer, Kelly Bond, who flicked through the days’ shoot on her digital camera to reveal reels of naked bods with precariously placed stripy Newmarket rugs, flashing farriers and rosettes hiding wobbly bits. It was then that the penny dropped that we had volunteered to star in a rustic retake of Calendar Girls.

So, with no time to think or back out, I was down to my Bridget Jones-style granny pants and in front of the lens with Eve’s enormous long face expertly placed in front of my modesty.

Nick was a natural naturist posing with two black Labradors on the steps of the Old Piggery. A few clicks, a packet of Polo mints (to placate Eve) and some expert airbrushing of granny pants later – Mr and Mrs January have made their modelling debut. We have even had our photograph sponsored by generous local electrical firm, Smart Merchants Ltd.

Last week the new calendar – All for the Love of Life – was launched after lots of dedication and hard work by Andrea and her team in memory of loved ones lost through this heartbreaking illness. And sorry, no sneak previews, you’ll have to buy it to ogle!

Hopefully you are now poised to buy a copy and celebrate life – and the odd bit of cellulite – with us. Find out more on Facebook at facebook.com/CharityCalender [sic], donate on Just Giving and keep an eye out for the new All for the Love of Life website where you’ll soon be able to order online. It’s £5.99 and all proceeds go towards putting an end to cancer.

It’s been an exciting nine months working at the Lords, writing news from the chamber and helping them launch a new Lords section on parliament.uk. I’ve enjoyed hopping into London, making new friends and learning more about such a grandfather institution.

Meanwhile there’s been a notable absence of my blogs (and tweets). Partly because a) I’ve been working on a full-time contract in the Westminster village and ran out of the extra writing steam that you need for an entertaining blog b) I’m politically impartial at the moment and have proudly been so through monarch visits and welfare reform and c) Have been my juggling superstar new horse with London full time. There’ll be much more on him later.

Watch this web space…

I have dragged my long suffering husband out of bed on many a weekend morning to support me at dressage shows with Eve and Rokke. He has spent hours in the freezing cold, wrapped in smelly horse rugs at the side of the collecting ring and endured the disappointment and euphoria that comes with the results. Someone I know once summed dressage up as ‘five hours for five minutes’ when talking about the preparation to actually test riding ratio. They were spot on.

And I’ve always had great respect for people that use their own legs in a competition; I can just about run 4kms and will invariably get a terrible stitch (how do you stop that?) and red, throbbing earlobes. It’s not unusual for Nick to nip out for a sly half marathon run at the weekend only to seem fairly bright and breezy on his return and then whiz around Sainsbury’s or mow the lawn.

On Sunday morning there we were in the local community centre in a sea of Lycra (some smaller coverings than others) signing in for the annual Billericay 10k, breathing in the intoxicating, heady stench of Deep Heat muscle rub.

What struck me more than anything, is how running has caught on in recent years and people are embracing the cardio and health benefits as well as the fact that pounds drop off. Nick is never alone on the Embankment when he hops out for a lunchtime jog. We are not just talking about a walk in the park – this is 10 undulating kilometres of course around flat Essex’s hillier town.

There’s something ‘feel good’ about being a spectator too. As I hung around along the final stretch, I couldn’t help feeling that Chariots of Fire urge to blub as runners surge towards the finish line and the digital clock, desperate to knock off a second from a personal best. Or the smug ‘girl power’ as the first female runner strides across the post beating most of the men.

Then there’s the mixed bag of ages, from whippersnapper to grey whiskers. On that chilly Sunday morning in the middle of suburbia, there was a real sense of community and equality. I like the runners’ world.

So, I take off my beagler hat to runners, especially my speedy husband who has burst back from injury to beat his personal best and get into the sub-43-minute league. The amazing thing is that we were back at home in the warm drinking tea for elevenses. No lorries to unpack, muck to shovel or horses to unplait.

This is by no means to oust my much-valued clients that are my bread and butter, but more  to get ‘out there’ a bit and test the market and find out what’s new. Maybe I have been lounging on my laurels, but I get a sense that things have changed since I last did the networking exercise. I certainly have had a wake up call this week.

I’d been doing some research into blogging as I very much enjoy writing this personal blog. I sent off a covering email to an agency or two who use regular bloggers.  Well, one did kindly reply to my email, which I am grateful for, but only to inform me that my pretty average word rate is a dozen times the going rate of their existing writer.

Now, I’m no mathematician, but I worked out that for a 500 word blog, they are paying a writer just £10!  I had to keep looking back at my calculator to check the decimal places were correct and even had to run through it with Mum, who is a retired ‘special needs’ teacher. Sadly, on this one occasion my sums were right. Well, I’m not an idle person, but if I’m ever desperate for work I might just opt for earning ten pounds less and go for a ride on Rokke instead or even paint my toenails.

Last week I had some extra time so I penned two short sample features for a potential client’s application exercise. I spent some time reviewing their publication, sussing out the tone of voice, style and readership and got to work on my short pieces. I pitched them carefully as there didn’t seem to be a set-in-stone editorial style to any of the examples, so went in somewhere midway. In fact, I was quietly confident that I do a good job as many of the sentences over-used the passive voice and imperative. If I sent copy like this to one of my favourite, meticulous editors they would send it straight back.

So I got down to work and wrote simple, straightforward pieces and at one point even went through again to dumb them down, thinking I was coming across a little too pompous and flowery. I confidently emailed them off.

Wake up call number two. The response was while the editor had ‘enjoyed’ my pieces, they had received many other exceptional pieces. A nicely worded and polite response but I didn’t even make an interview for a bit of freelance work. Why send a backpacker to The Ritz?

I thought I’d try and stay fit while we were away and do some jogging on the treadmill and I have to say it hasn’t worked one iota for riding fitness at all. I was still huffing and puffing after my first canter on Rokke. Bobby has been expertly schooling him for two weeks so he was ‘up for it’ to say the very least.

Then came another very welcome arrival while we were away. My made-to-measure Konig Favorit boots have been delivered from The Netherlands, beautifully crafted to fit like a glove by Jo Viehoff. I’m a very lucky lady indeed but have had to go through a week of ugly-sister-slipper torture, bruised shins and blistered feet – not to mention the moaning.

It was worth it, they now feel great and it’s the first time in my life that I have ever had a pair of riding boots that fit properly. There’s no stepping back to squeaky leather Mark Todd field boots or Nora Batty Ariat Bromonts now. I’ll be strutting up the centre line at the weekend like SJP in a pair of Manolo Blahniks.

So it’s back to the drawing board with dressage. I’ve got to say that, as well as my lessons, the lateral movement ‘shoulder in’ has been a good ‘fixer’. I remember my friend and Eve’s previous owner, Amanda, saying ‘never underestimate the usefulness of shoulder in’. She is totally right. As an all-round correctional technique it works wonders. Especially with us lop-sided riders – you have to make sure that your shoulders are in line with your horse’s shoulders for the ‘in’ bit of the exercise, or it doesn’t happen.

The trick (in theory) is that the horse flexes through his body so that his legs are working across three imaginary tramlines. That’s the outside hind leg on the normal track, the inside hind and outside shoulder on an invisible middle tramline and the inside shoulder in the third, innermost line (still with me?). The Classical Dressage website gives a great technical, textbook-style explanation.

This nifty little bit of lateral work helps with everything. The horses’ hindquarters have to be engaged and stepping under or it’s impossible – you’ll feel like you are riding a pantomime horse instead. The horse has to work through his rib cage so it can eradicate stiffness in all other work (for us this is the right canter). The neck has to be soft to get a little bit of bend (but not too much, as the bend is through the body), which will help with suppleness.  For the rider it’s all about straightness, control, balance – all the boxes are ticked.

But Rokke is a sensitive boy, which teaches me a lot. There are several ways to set up and start a ‘shoulder in’. One of the most obvious is to ride as if you are starting a circle to position the horse and then continue with this bend along the track. This doesn’t work for us as we end up shooting halfway across the arena.

My trainer Gill’s ‘tea tray’ analogy is much more subtle and totally foolproof – especially for riders like myself who need every technique explained in metaphor. Think of it as a little bit of ladylike deportment.

You simply pick up an imaginary tea tray with your hands (in the real world they are holding the reins evenly with thumbs up) and place the tea tray to the inside. You are carrying fine bone China so you have to be light with your hands. The action keeps your hands in position and it moves your body subtly so that the horse takes the movement. Get the tea trays out girls!