Time to shop!

Have managed to fit in a fair bit of shopping in the last few days. On Tuesday Laura, James and I went to Habitat to investigate the Sale, and James found the very first item he designed for them, a bathroom rack. It had just come in that morning, just one, and so I bought it straight away! So in my bathroom is one of the first, if not the first chrome bathroom rack off the production line, and I keep taking people up to the bathroom to see it, as my son designed it..... there was an amusing moment as I was buying it, when the assistant at the next till spotted my purchase and says, 'Oh, that's nice, I didn't see that come in, I need a vegetable rack'..I thought James would throw an artistic tantrum, but he took it well, and now jokes about me having a vegetable rack in my bathroom....

I went in to work for an hour yesterday, and also had a quick coffee out with a friend, and a look at the shops, but bought nothing.

Today David made his usual annual shopping trip to the Galleria Outlet Centre to buy suits, shirts, etc for work in the sales. For the past two years I have accompanied as Style Advisor, and last year, avid blog readers may remember, Clive came too and we had a weird threesome in the shops...

This year Clive expressed an interest in going again, but when David arrived to pick him up, he changes his mind, so I went again, and over five hours advised on shoes, shirts, ties and a suit. Just the one this year. I bought a CD, a DVD and a Winnie the Pooh sticker calendar, so I had a great time and have things to play with now.

Of course when David rang this morning to suggest the outing, I was still in bed, given that a snowflake had passed the window, and I thought it dangerous to get up. The TV weather man said so, 'Don't go out.' 'Yes,' said David, 'That applies to Yorkshire, not Hertfordshire.' 'You can't be too careful,' I said, 'bring the Landrover and extras like a shovel, blanket, food and a flask.' 'We are only going to the Galleria,' he said, 'Two miles up the road, and any way, wouldn't it be fun to get stuck in a snow storm?' 'Oh yes,' I said, 'So just bring the blanket, a flask and some chocolate and don't bother about the shovel.'

Needless to say we got home safely. I am sitting in front of a log fire and the Christmas tree, eating chocolate. The mother in law has gone home, as has James - with my car. Clive is upstairs on the computer, so it's just me and the dog. More chocolate then....and time to think what I am going to do with myself in the New Year...more of the same? Or shall I make drastic changes? Place your bets.....

Merry Crimble...

..as John Lennon used to say. I have to blod today or I am in danger of becoming a once-a-week blogger which wouldn't do at all!

Here I am sat in front of a roaring log fire (or would be if it didn't look dangerously like going out.....the logs are slightly charred.....) but the tree lights are on and sparkly and there is a promise of snow outside, so it still feels like Christmas, even if it is officially over...

I am eating chocolate and drinking tea, feeling virtuous cos I have taken Sophie out for a post-Christmas walk in the cold..that's my first outing for three days! Didn't even make it to church Christmas morning, which is a first...best draw a veil over Christmas morning...at least Clive stayed at home with me, realising I needed company and he ought to provide it...that's a first!

James, Laura and Mec were with us for Christmas Day, and it was lovely. We even played Trivial Pursuit!!

What to do for dinner tonight...cold turkey? Turkey risotto? Turkey curry? Turkey soup? Oh, I'll just have another piece of chocolate.......

Where did the week go?

Realised it is a week since I blogged. How did that happen I hear you ask? What have you been doing? Well........ been either very very busy or wrecked and trying to sleep! The last two or three weeks I have been much, much better, emotionally, and have gone from crying all the time and barely able to cope, to my lowest point of thinking, actually I am going to have a complete breakdown now..to sudddenly, overnight almost, being ok and almsot a normal person!

Hence I have been really engaging in work, have been very busy, would lvoe to tell you all about it, but obviously can't! But apart from the normal work I seem to have had an awful lot of meetings with various agencies..... so while that is good and I am functioning well, and am feeling happier, I have gone back to not sleeping quite so well, and could spend all evening asleep!

So although I have logged on and read blogs, and in fatt have had a lot to blog about, I have just felt too tired, and to use an overused phrase..could I be bovvered? No.

So I haven't told you about the moment in bed when the earth moved for me - (and that hasn't happened in along time! Ho ho ho) - yes, the 6am explosion at the Buncefield oil depot. I should have taken pictures from our lounge window, it's not far away and I didn't even know the place existed! Well, it doesn't much now..... all the children in Hemel stayed off school and lay about in their track suits watching TV..no change there then..sorry, that's the kind of jokes going round St Albans.....

Loads more to tell, including the highlight...a tip to see Billy Elliot the musical..but I must get up and have a bath before work, the shower is broken..it slowly died when I was in it on Sunday morning, the water just faded away leaving me soapy and with a head full of conditioner and me pleading with the motor..no, no, just another 30 seconds, please.... I was saying this out loud to the shower and meaning it, so you see why I say I am almost normal........

Re Advent Calendars......

Further to the blog by Liz about advent calendars, I think I had them as a child but no chocolate, and I always bought one for James and Laura and they had to take it in turns to open the windows......why on earth I didn't pay another 50p and buy two to spare the rows, arguing and fighting that went with cries of 'It's not fair, it was my turn, he/she opened it yesterday,' and the tears, I don't know, I obviously thought learning to share was character building (It obviously worked, look at them now, Ed).

When they left home and went to Uni, I used to send them an advent calendar every year, a big one containing chocolate that was a nightmare to post, but it had to be done. I have continued every year.....last year Laura had one that had to be built into a 3D stable, and the chocolates were in the roof, it was bloody massive......

This year I bought three, one for Laura and Mec, one each for James and Hilary, and I found a lovely shop in St Albans that sold tasteful lovely Medici advent calendars that were small cards, with lovely traditional scenes on, just right for posting to now grown up children. I popped them in their envelopes to post, but then met up with Laura for Christmas shopping.

I handed her the small red envelope, and she said, 'Oh, thanks, is this my Christmas card, that's early!' 'No,' I said, 'It's your advent calendar.' The double take she did at the envelope and the short silence that ensued, well she might as well have had a thought bubble over her head which said, 'Oh, no chocolate then.' After a pause she said, 'Oh thank you.'

As she was due to meet up with James, I gave her the other two to deliver. So far, no-one has said thank you. I can only assume an advent calendar without chocolate isn't worth saying thank you for, or Laura thought it wasn't actually worth delivering........

Have a confession to make......

I am sitting in bed with the laptop on my knees! Have got very fond of being in bed recently...I am frequently a little late for work due to a reluctance to get up, and on Saturday morning stayed tucked up til 10am, having cups of tea, reading, doing sudokus which are so wonderfully relaxing and satisfying...as long as they are not too difficult of course.....

Anyway, you may have noticed that all my keys appear to be working, plenty of mmmmmm's abound, and I no longer have a problem. It started when the semi colon/colon key stopped working and I rang Acer and they said I had to send the laptop to them to mend, but it would be gone 10 days...for the past three weeks I have been trying to manage withnout using ; or : as I didn't want to be without for 10 days, but then it started working again on its own, so I thought..wonderful! Then immediately the m key started playing up. I thought maybe Acers just had crap keyboards which died one key at a time....

But when Laura and Mec were round on Sunday, Mec having been called in to help restore our home pc, bless him, everyone ahould have a computer genius in the family, I was giving them lunch as a reward when I remembered that as a Mac Genius in the Apple shop, he must have seen macs with dodgy keyboards, so I told him about mine and wondered what the cure might be...'Mother, he has just spent two hours fixing dad's computer, leave him alone' says Laura (quite right too, the boy is trying to eat his lunch) but fortunately Mec's curiousity gets the better of him and he asks to look at the laptop. He presses the m key and agrees there is a problem. 'Don't worry, please leave it,' I say, 'I'll send it off to Acer.'

Mec asks for a small screwdriver, so I find a little glasses repair kit which contains the tiniest screwdriver in the world. He poked carefully under the key and slowly removed the screwdriver and held it up.... it looked suspiciously like a small piece of chocolate..Laura and Mec looked at me accusingly and Laura said sternly, 'Mother, stop eating chocolate while you are working on your laptop, what are you like!' and I turned into sulky, embarrassed child trying to justify messy eating habits.......

After they had gone, I thought, surely a tiny piece of chocolate would melt when the laptop gets warm, and wouldn't resist a key being depressed..so I looked closely at the tiny offending item...it was like a small brown flake. I pressed it with my fingernail. It broke in two. Then I realised what it was...really.....a tiny piece of the shell of an M & M........

Isn't technology amazing....

I know we take it for granted, and it irritates the hell out of us when it won't work, or is slow..like takes 3 seconds to connect... but think about it. I remember seeing TV programes about computers years ago, and e xperts saying soon coputers will be small, not room sized, and every hoe will have one....why? I thought. Why would every hoe want a computer? What wojuld we do with one?

Now here I am, just a few years later, sitting up warm and comfy in bed, with my lap top on my knees, happily e-mailing the world (or friends in far away places) and reading and writing blogs, connecting with the big wide world without leaving my bed. Next to me is my little mobile phone, sending and receiving texts to all and sundry ( or it would if sundry ever texted me) and I can chat to people while they are on trains, at work, at home, or in strange hotels miles away late at night.

I know there are downsides to this constant communication and I am sad and think I have no friends if an hour goes by without receiving a text, but really, I love it...the only problem is with e-mailing and texting and blogging..I've just realized I haven't actually spoken to anyone in days. Oh, sob.....

My secretary has had a couple of days off as her mum was taken to hospital and her dad was at home alone insisting he could manage, but not really..sounds familiar? She has taken her mum home from hospital now and back worrying and wondering how they will manage.... and my good friend R whose parents live on Ibiza, worries about her dad who has been in a care home for a year now, since he was too unwell for her mum to care for him, she has been preparing herself all year for the call to say he has died....well yesterday at work she got a call to say her mum has died, which was not expected and such a shock. I hope I can be the strength, comfort and rock for others as they have been to me.

Bored now.....

..with not having the coputer at hoe. And this lap top having a duff m key. Which soeimes works and soetimes doesn't. hey ho. Clive took out coputer in to be ended by his coputer genius only he is unreliable and hasn't shown up. So I haven't received any home e-mails for a week now. very boring. So ring e if you need e!

Went to see Harry Potter on Friday night..you know, husbnad says: Would you like to go to the cinema? Me Yes, what fils are on? Husband, Harry Potter 8.30p. Oh, that'll be what I want to see then. It was good. I enjoyed it. Only long, so I did sleep a bit during some of the long goodies v baddies bits...zzzzzzzzzzzzz..lovely.

Sunday..well don't faint but I went to church! Only the second time since the Festival. It was ok, I didn't get upset and I sang too. A breakthrough. Might go again one day..sermon was about being at peace..knowing God's peace rather than peace the world gives, so quite apt really.

Was at a conference all day Monday, and Rosemarie and I planned shopping, eating and the cinema at the end of the day. We got tickets to see rs Henderson Presents. All was going well...we started with a cup of tea while we caught up, and I was feeling happy and talkative, so I chatted on, and by the end of the tea break Rosemarie had a migraine coing on and had to go hoe. Was sick as soon as she got home, so it was the right decision. I wandered about and did a bit of shopping, then got our oney back on the tickets (thank you, nice cinema man) and I went hoe. I must learn not to talk so much and make people ill......

Good days and bad days.....

Tuesday was a Bad Day. Wednesday was OK. Woke up feeling desperate on Thursday. Felt ill, really bad...made it into work, late again. But the shopping with Laura was good, we had a fun evening and even achieved soe Christas shopping. Woke up Friday feeling better, more together, and was fairly productive at work. Counselling was good, I talked for an hour and didn't cry at all! Felt I a getting somewhere processing feelings and emotions, although felt altogther over the last week I have not been coping. Decided not to increase anti-depressants, counsellor agreed with e.

However, we did discusss the dreaded enapause, is it that which is making me such a physical and eotional wreck? Should I give HRT a try? I know, I know, no-one wants to talk about it, everyone is too young to want to think about it, but for an over 50 like me....I have to. If I am getting in to this territory, then at least I would know I am not just going mad!! So it might be back to the doctor...

After counselling I have tea with a friend and for a change I do the listening and therapy. I feel together and OK, and am glad to be a sounding board. After which Clive and I go and see Harry Potter and of course, insoniac that I am, I fall asleep befoe the end.

Today I went into St Albans with DC, we had breakfast out and did lots of Christmas shopping and laughed a lot at tacky, battery driven Christmas toys, don't laugh...one may be heading your way..yes we bought some... had to walk away in one shop when I realised David had istaken custoers for shop assistants, and was about to acost them and ask the questions...rather than let him know his istake, I walked away giggling. I heard 'Oh, sorry, I didn't realise you were customers,' and he followed me, looking slightly ebarrassed. When he realised I knew, he called e a rude name.

We had fun, I did ore shopping, we didn't argue and I didn't get upset. Just a lovely, noral day. Thank you God.

Nearly time....

...to go Christmas shopping! With my lovely daughter, Laura, we are having a girl's shopping night....

Having to write this on y lap-top which is playing up and won't do sei-colons ; oh it just did, or ms which it also just did then but not before but ostly (see what I ean?) wont'. So sorry about the lack of s. see? didn;t do one. ystery. ust i send my laptop away for repair? I'll iss it.

Anyway have to use lap-top cos Clive has taken our coputer into work to get it 'seen to'. If only he would leave it alone....

Went back to the doctor yeaterday. having a bad, bad tie. He suggested I double the dose of anti-depressants but I don't want to cos of the side effects. I told hi y astha was playing up - George lent e her inhaler in Yorkshire..so he prescribed one for me and also gave e a flu jab. Bonus!

Any advice on my non functioning m button - oh it worked - would be very gratefully received. I a so easily pleased! (When I' not crying of course...)