Sunday 24 May 2009

Splendid Sunny Sunday

- and I've got a hangover! I allowed myself 2 whole glasses of rosy plonk at the family barbecue yesterday - dizzying stuff. How I would have laughed 20 years ago at the cheap date I would become .

So today we're having a slobby day in jimjams. Sadly the garden is too much of a jungle (waist high grass, or should that be dandelions and weeds?) to sit out and enjoy the forthcoming airshow. It should be a cracker this year, for the first time in donkeys' the skies are clear and bright - it truly is a beautiful day.

Situated where we are, about a mile and a half uphill from the estuary, we can see most of the displaying planes when the weather's like this, without leaving the house. We even catch most of the tricks of the Red Arrows - stunning. But Big Chief White Hair wants to go see the display on the cliffs tomorrow, and do the thing properly for a change.

That reminds me of a twinge I had on Friday. Or was it Wednesday? Not nostalgia, exactly, but the feeling that I'm missing something. It can't be nostalgia, as it's not something I recall doing particularly often; but here we live in a hugely populated part of the country that is almost a suburb of London, 45 miles to the east; but we have parks (5 within about 2 - 3 miles of home), gardens, sea, woods - acres and acres and miles of woods - country parks, to say nothing of sports facilities (council and private), cinemas, masses of kids' entertainments. We are so lucky to live here - all we have to do is live down the white-stilettos-and-shell-suits image held by so many of this actually beautifully green and surprisingly low-crime part of the country. And of course, blessed with so much on my doorstep, how often do I go to those same parks / woods / beaches / entertainments?

On whichever day it was, just as I left the local shopping emporium to trundle home on Freya, I caught a sight of the sea, peering at me through the shops in the High Street, and calling to me at a very instinctive level. Come, it said; your battery's got enough charge for a little detour to see me. But I turned my back, too much to do, too little time. Never mind, I heard it say, you'll be back soon...

And so tomorrow, with engines roaring above, crowds milling (do they mill? Why do they mill and not grind?) I'll go see the sea, and say sorry.

Thursday 21 May 2009

A day like no other.

It's been an extraordinary couple of days really. Young Master needs reading glasses, we find, so they're on order; I wish I could get 2 pairs for £20! So now MiniMe is even more of a MiniMe - even their glasses match.

But it's yesterday that really sticks in my mind. From the minute I got up and made my way into town to have coffee with Arrabella people seemed to be falling over themselves to help me. Or maybe they were diving out from under my scooter wheels.

Freya is a little thing, with a turning circle of 2.76 centimetres. She breaks up into little pieces when needed. She was red once; but now owned by an anarchist, she has a three-way colour scheme with no 2 pieces in a pair of strips the same colour. She is blue and red and grey, and so will go with any colour scheme I choose to wear. Apart of course from lilac, pink, beige, brown - I never wear yellow - and green among others. But at least I'd never lose her on a shopping spree.

So whether it was survival instinct and an effort to escape being mown over at a very slow 4mph, or whether through sheer niceness of being humans sharing a sunny day in a pretty nice town to live in, I received help, excellent service, understanding, humour, and even an offer to split a bogoff on hair colour, that alas came to nothing. A 5-minute friendship is what Young Master called it in the car later; and it was just that, a temporary link of like-mindedness in someone of a similar age, well she was probably somewhat older than me, but not by much I'd say.

I now have two wardrobes. One in one size for when I'm not on medication, am or have been exercising, or else so ill I haven't eaten for a fortnight. The other is for reality days when nothing I want to wear fits any more. I have elastic bingo wings that seem to spread and contract on an almost daily basis, so just never know whether I'll get my arms into sleeves or not on any given day. My new day-old wardrobe is an eclectic collection of whites, reds and blacks, with a touch of navy and khaki thrown in for good measure. At least I'm going to feel comfortable and hopefully look nice this summer. But even the push-up bras I bought last summer, that give a lovely smooth profile under teeshirts with none of the wobble factor associated in F-G cups look saggy now.

I'm cross about my hair too. It's been cut into layers, after years of being a gorgeous bob in one length. I don't quite know how this mistake happened; but now it pokes out all over the place, has absolutely no shape and I can literally do nothing with it but stick it all behind my ears. Ho hum. It'll grow, but until then I'll feel messy no matter what I'm wearing. Hang ups are so funny.

Anyway on my way home last night, trundling along several hours after Freya's battery should have given out by rights, I passed a woman in white of a certain age. She didn't know she was of a certain age, that's for sure. She was tall, curvy in all the right places without being overblown in any of them, a bottle straw blonde, but beautiful with it. As I approached her, she held her face up to the rays of the 5 o'clock sun, and seemed to revel in its feel on her face, in a movement that was sensuous and unconscious. It was one of those moments that I think women can and do share comfortably with each other without sexual overtones, and I shared in her rejoice of the sun. It was uplifting. And I realised how little it would take to make me that woman - if only I had a decent bloomin haircut that is!

Bloke Said.

According to one of our cab drivers today, all the thousands of pink sacks that go out each week for recycling end up in landfill anyway. "There's no money in it" said our Sage of the Steering. "Bin Man told me".

We put 3 or 4 pink sacks out per week. Not just trees, but plastic bottles, cartons, tin foil, tins, aluminium cans, glass - you name it. All in one sack. The only stuff that needs to be sorted differently are textiles, which used to go into the pink sacks until they started collecting glass that way. Now clothing and shoes go in white sacks. Garden stuff goes out in green or grey sacks, I forget which, and food waste for composting in blue bins. Landfill or recylcing - at least bin days are colourful now. Hopefully Bin Man enjoys the diversity.

I'd prefer to continue believing that I'm helping the environment with my one black sack for every 6 or 7 pink ones.

Tuesday 19 May 2009

Hourses for Corses

Today I am obsessed with Virago Meridian. Well no, not really; but I do tend to go to enormous lengths to justify spending money - sometimes. My phone (Sago) is hopelessly slow, has an appallingly small memory and sends quite small texts as multiples. I do miss my wuvely Samsung! but sadly can no longer text with it - and what is a phone for if not for texting and taking pics? Talking? Me? On a phone? I think not.

It's a kind of phobia apart from anything else. Based on my Revenue days, when a phone ringing might mean a little old lady in need of someone to talk to, who maybe hasn't spoken to another human being this past fortnight - well it was my job to be that human being, and to my management's great and everlasting credit, they would actively encourage such use of business time and money. Or it could bring death threats, you pays your money... So apart from the few who were out to fiddle, there were so so many lives I touched, and can I say it was in a good way? I hope for some it was. So I have huge emotional issues with phones.

And then there's my hands. Swollen and knobbly and painful because I haven't done enough knitting lately. Too much D S! Actually not enough energy to knit, poor me. So it's tricky trying to press buttons, and speak to someone in a normal tone of voice when my hands are hurting and shaking with the effort of holding the phone up. Ah well such is life!

So I accosted some poor youth in one of the mobile shops this evening. Big Chief Whitehair had come home with his own version of poorly hands (which puts my pathetic examples to shame) and I helped him collect Young Master from The Academy, and he ran me into town to accost same poor youth. I walked into the store, to see a - gaggle? google? nah, slouch of some dozen or so teens - or so they seem to my bitterly ageing eyes - who fell silent and watched me with a degree of horror in their eyes as I sticked my way across the store. It was quite funny really. I was very aware of greasy hair, unmake-up and slouchy clothes - for once I wasn't wearing my slippers hehe - and I just looked back at them, shrugged my shoulders, and said "Anyone?"

This poor youth came and helped me as I examined some new mobiles for arthriti-textability. I found some lovely phones, and he did his best to help, and was extremely patient with me. If only twere not for the internet discounts, I would have given him the sale - but I guess I'm as greedy as the next consumer. I came away empty-handed - not having even taken a handbag or purse with me. I could have offered a tissue in payment, clean of course, but decided not to. After all I might have to go back in there one day.

But that's only half the sad sorry tale. I need a new internet provider, and cable is looking attractive. Butternut charges me an arm and a leg for phonecalls, Supersupreme just about doubled my broadband charges in one month, so why not go to someone who can do both, and throw in Discover Channel on top? Hmmmm...

So I went to enormous lengths to cost up the benefits. Such lengths in fact, that I've still only done half the job; and now all I can think of is Virago Meridian, and whether B C W-H's hard earned cash will be safe in their hands. He thinks I'm obsessing; it's true I am. And this is where I came in.

Monday 18 May 2009

Ummm Ahhh indeed...

When have I ever been short of words online? When presented with a blank page on which to blurt I suppose...

I've been thinking about doing this for years'n'years, in fact do a kind of blog in the Pink Palace (cheers and whistles in the background); but this is a different-feeling beast. This might be read by someone other than very dear friends. Well it might be read by someone else - if they're really unlucky.

So what did I do today? I jumped out of bed with unnatural haste, and am sat here in jimjams creating a blog. It's only half nine for goodness sake, what else could possibly be achieved at this time of the morning? I have a Day of Delight ahead - piles of washing and laundry to do - so long as I don't have to go back in The Bedroom (dum dum dahhhhh) to put it away before Big Chief Whitehair comes home to hold my hand and tell me I'm daft. Ooo I forgot - I did a bit of research between the jumping and the blogging, and finally read what can best be described as a work of art before taking the plunge. M I B - thank you.

I'm going now because if I write it all down today I won't have anything "interesting" (yeah right) to bang on about tomorrow. Or ever again. The morning sunlight that poured gold over the keyboard has gone, the rain is scrawling shorthand all over my window, so if I don't go now I'll be mesmerised, and what a lost housework opportunity that would be.