Tuesday 28th December - Monotonous?

Another day off...

It's mostly through lack of sleep, as well as the cold and the cough and the sore throat...

I read for a couple of hours 'after lights out' a couple of nights ago, as my kindle has a backlight. I am careful to avoid shining it in his direction, and shield it slightly with the duvet. Oh, those memories of reading under the bed covers as a child, as the torchlight changed from white to yellow, and then flickered to nothing just the most exciting part of the story got under way... I was propped up on three pillows - impossible for sleeping, but helps prevent coughing.

Last night I dozed off to Neil MacGregor's podcast called 'Living with the Gods'. It is very interesting, but also soporific, especially if the volume is slightly too low. I started listening to something about the mystical meanings of sunrise, but didn't get very far in. At least I managed to sleep for a couple of hours at a time before spluttering to wide awake and coughing and so on.

But every day, in every way, I am actually getting a bit betterer and betterer.

I took this morning in bed - breakfast in bed AND lunch in bed - we shall sleep among crumbs tonight, no doubt!

Today's reading included a book called 'How to draw without talent' -  a sort of drawing course which I follow from time to time. - and I did quite a lot of talentless drawing. Also watercolours, which takes some concentration when sitting up in bed as you need to be very sure where the water bottle is at all times.

Here is my drawing of the litter of stuff spread out over the bed

Add caption

The pages of the book I painted in below, are much too thin for paint - who cares. That's what all these fancy these elastic bands are for - uncrinkling your pages of course.

 
Kindle is a terrible temptation. I've now downloaded and read the whole of the Robert Carey series by P F Chisholm, and she's left a cliff hanger at the end of the last book, but not yet released the next episode. Some terrible has happened to Lady Widdrington, and Sir Robert is flying in the face of providence to the rescue - no, not literally flying because it is about 1590 and they haven't got helicopters yet - He's galloping to the rescue. I think it is all her horrible husband's doing, and that suspicious man they met 100 pages before is a witchfinder and the good Lady Widdrington is to be tried as a witch. I hope her ghastly gouty husband gets what's coming to him after all these books. Watch this space - for about a year -

As I can't follow Robert the Courtier on his next adventure, I have downloaded 'The Bird in the Tree' by Elizabeth Goudge for gentle reading. Only 99p - cheaper than Oxfam. She lists all the flowers that grow in the marshes as although I know the names I don't know what they look like.

Rather than just look them up, I copied them (very approximately)

The book was written in 1940, so is very old-fashioned - and set in a most wonderful fairy-tale country house based on Harewood House (now demolished) near Bucklers Hard.

I've also turned some of these coloured blobs into birds - an idea from a youtube
video.

I have resisted downloading 'Rewilding Yourself' by Simon Barnes. I had a look at the free sample, though, and it is definitely going on the list. I now need to look up some butterflies that he discusses...

Sunday 26th January - a week? a whole week?

Where did the time go?

Time passes in a blur when you have been felled by the most dismal cough and cold since - since - I don't know when.

I've managed to teach most lessons last week, although I gave in to the inevitable on Friday -stayed in bed all morning, cancelled the drumming workshop in the evening.

There was a time when I would have merely dosed myself up on max-strength Aspro, or something similar, and kept on trucking, but those days are long gone now! I've held off from starting the antibiotics for another day or so - at the moment it is just a grotty cold.

However, things have Got Done, mainly by Himself while I've been lolling in bed. Like taking the IKEA bag of charity shop donations to the charity shop, and fetching and installing our new computer chair

and fetching and installing our new computer chair

and even taking the broken computer chair from our bedroom to the tip. So, the shabby computer chair is now back in one of the bedrooms, the computer chair with the worn out upholstery is in our bedroom, and the broken chair is at the tip.

I've laid out the crochet granny squares on a spare bed;

Neither of us like the pinky-red square so I have pulled it out, and will replace it with a new one. I have two balls of yarn left, and I'll probably choose the blue-ish mixture in the foreground. I'm still pondering that very green square - is it too green?

The amaryllis flowers have been a huge success. This big stripy one was threatening to topple over, so I have propped it up with a wooden coat-hanger, hooking the hook around the stalk and pushing the wooden bit firmly into the pot. Although I notice that after I had watered it, the stalk straightened up and is no longer leaning into the hook.

They are in the window of a front bedroom, and make a cheery sight when I turn into the drive after a teaching session.

Short blog tonight, just enough to convince our Canadian friends that we are still alive if not kicking...

I've cancelled tomorrow morning's teaching to give me a last chance to catch up with myself before the murder and mayhem of the rest of the week, no, that doesn't sound like a right and proper description of three days intensive piano teaching. I've been reading too much historical fiction set in the days of Elizabeth the First. (The Robert Carey series by P F Chisolm)

Friday 17th January - Week End, Week Beginning

I find working out where one week ends and the other begins rather tricky.

When does the 'weekend' begin? When is the weekend?

I think of Friday as being the 'weekend', as it is a non-teaching day, apart from the drumming workshop in the evening which is very informal.

Saturday is NOT a 'weekend' day, as I have a fairly gruelling teaching session taking up all of the morning - eight pupils back-to-back. Saturday afternoon is 'recovery' time.

Sunday - ah yes, another 'weekend' day, especially if I am not down on a church rota. Playing the piano or organ in a church service is definitely 'work' - if I do a whole service then I will play a couple of pieces at the beginning, a couple of pieces while people go up to receive communion, and a short burst of something cheerful at the end. Oh, and three hymns, of anything up to six verses each. That's work.

Then it's Monday again! Just like that!

So, today was a sort of 'weekend' day. Up early, off to my God-mother's house to tidy up, meet the Estate Agent, clean the loo and the fridge, collect up all the unused medicines (three bags full - she'd just had a new prescription delivered), break open a filing cupboard in the garage (pots of old paint and a painter's floor cloth securely locked away from... who? whom?) and return the despised and ignored Zimmer frame to the hospital.

After lunch (fish and chips at the same garden centre as last Friday) we called into an amazing furniture store in Guildford. Our favourite computer chair in the sitting room has a tendency to catch the underside of the desk, lifting it and dropping it onto the cables, so we've swapped it for a better behaved chair from upstairs. However, the fabric is wearing through and it is showing its age (about twenty years).

Here's what we bought, in a darker colour wood. Happily, it is in the sale! We should be getting it in a couple of weeks.


   

On the way I finished the second slipper, and I'm wearing them both now.

Now I am in between knitting projects - what next?

Wednesday 15th January - Rain and Wind and Sun

So what have we been up to since Sunday?

It all depended on the weather. Storm Brendan was due, with implications for going to Bracknell to visit my Godmother's house on the Tuesday (strong winds, heavy rain, risk of falling trees and flooded roads).

somersetlive.co.uk

The first change of plan was to reschedule the visit for another time, and the second change of plan was to get on with completing the Probate forms, and deliver them to the Probate Registry in Brighton on Monday. Which we did. The forms were nowhere near as complicated as I had feared, and once we had scanned them in, and assembled the necessary supporting paperwork, the job was just about done. The advantages of actually taking them into the office were

Firstly, I got to press the sort of counter bell that goes 'ping'

from amazon

which is something I've always wanted to do in a real life situation

and secondly, someone answered the bell, went through all the paperwork, checked that everything was present and correct and gave me a receipt. Now we just have to wait.

Tuesday was teaching day. It dawned bright and clear, but Storm Brendan arrived over lunch time and by the end of the school day it was properly and wetly raining. When we went to bed we could hear the wind gusting against the front windows and blustering at the back.

I was unspeakably weary by the end of Tuesday - just waiting around to go to bed - but I did manage to finish knitting the first of a pair of slippers

The sole is dark brown, and the upper a speckly grey

 I need to sew it up. And also, knit up another slipper! I haven't decided whether to make it identical, or use the grey for the sole and the speckly brown for the upper. Need to give it a bit more thought.

We woke up to find a fence panel and a bird feeder from next door (on the windward side) cluttering up the garden, and another panel propped up by a couple of shrubs.

I drove through flooded lanes to my Wednesday school, taught seven pupils (the first four had forgotten their books which would have been more irritating except I've long given up being irritated.) What was rather fun was giving an impromptu djembe lesson to the staff in the staff room - they have a class set of djembes and no-one to teach it anymore. The music curriculum that they are supposed to follow is (in my opinion) dull and (in my opinion) difficult to teach, especially to the older classes. I tried following it one year and abandoned it fairly quickly.

Off to my afternoon school, where I teach a whole class of 7-year-old children to play guitar (no, I'm not a guitar player or teacher... it's a long story, don't ask) was plagued by a faulty fire alarm system so, after two fire alarms in succession (the first happened just before I got there, the second just after the children had all been allowed back in), the head teacher stationed me beside the alarm panel with instructions to press the 'mute' button if it sounded again, and, clutching a hammer, disappeared round the back of the school to...

well, the alarm didn't go off again, and a message was sent round to say that if there was a fire, someone would Ring The Bell.

Amazingly the children settled quickly, and I was able to teach them a new chord.
Unfortunately I taught the new chord incorrectly, but had just enough time to admit my mistake and re-teach. What did I say about being a guitar teacher?

Home, to find N and next-door lifting manhole covers and trying to clear the drains. Again. The blockage from Christmas time hadn't actually Gone Away, just Moved On Down The Drain.

I shut the door to the kitchen to keep the heat on, and carried on teaching piano lessons through the chaos.

Dynarod came and eventually cleared it; they'd had a terrible day and the Dynarod man was ready to say that it was the Water Authority's turn, but N charmed him into one last effort which seemed to have done the trick.

not our drain

IN among all this, I dealt with a call from the home prescription deliver service, and N dealt with two requests for taxis. The taxi telephone calls don't bode well; there is a firm with almost the same telephone number as is, but their last digit is an 8. They used to have cards in fancy curly script, and everyone needing a taxi used to get the number wrong, especially late at night. We used to give them the number of a rival firm. Eventually I found out why we were getting the calls, rang the taxi firm and explained why we had been inadvertently sending their customers elsewhere. I think they must have hastily reprinted their cards, because the called stopped. Or else they went bust through lack of custom?

from amazon

Is it still Wednesday? I think it may be - it feels as though we've had a week already.

Sunday 12th January 2020 - Do Nothing Day

Almost nothing.

I brought up breakfast in bed of cereals and coffee, he served up a second breakfast later on of Croissants and coffee. That's quite a good way of arranging things - saves filling the bed with crumbs.

There were several loads put through the washing machine and hung up to dry,

There was cleaning of the bathroom,

The sun came out, and there nearly was Going for a Walk, but there were also huge black clouds, so we did planting of anenomes (two) and moving of flower pots (what seemed like thousands) instead.

There was examination of the probate forms to see if we were in a position to complete them and be ready to send them on their way (we think we are). 

There was catching up with writing quotations, collected over several weeks, into my commonplace book (posh name for notebook!)

There was paying some bills and so forth.

There was baking; my 2020 Almanac has several recipes for each month; the lentil one I did last week, and the roasted rhubarb one I tried today. Also very good, if you like rhubarb. Which I do. And he doesn't, so it's all be mine, all mine!

(cut the rhubarb into useful lengths, toss in orange juice and honey (I used maple syrup) and star anise (I left that out, not my favourite flavour) and roast at 180 fan oven for 20 minutes. I'm pleased that I lined the roasting dish..., although the rhubarb didn't stick, and the maple syrup didn't burn onto the pan.

There was spare rhubarb, so I made puff pastry rhubarb crumble tarts (also all mine).

Then there was spare puff pastry, so I made cheese straws. Not so successful - more cheese would have improved them.

Recipes, from the internet

 Like I said - an almost nothing day, compared to previous days;

Friday - checking my godmother's house, talking to her neighbours, talking to various offices in connection with the house, buying lunch at a garden centre (and flowers for friends, and anenomes for me), calling in at the funeral director to tie up loose ends... and leading the drumming workshop when we got home

Saturday - teaching all morning, now that it is term time again. Eight pupils, back to back. That was a bit of a shock to the system, sitting around in a semi-catatonic state all afternoon and evening...

Ah well. Half term in five weeks time...

Now there is to be Eating of Supper provided by my nearest and dearest - yum yum!

Thursday 9th January 2020 - As we were...

I promised a photograph of my Spring wreath...

I saved the greenery, the fir cones and the little cinnamon decoration, and added the pink flowers and twisty sticks.

Leo-the-cat seems to have stopped being irritated by the bald patch on her head where the worm medicine was applied.

I have no idea if McCavity is better or worse - she behaves much as she always has - sleeps during the day, apart from waking to eat, and possibly goes out at night - I'm not staying up to find out. There is no evidence either way at her nether end, I'm glad to say.

Yesterday as I drove along the lanes to the rural school, I saw the rooks sitting beside their nests in both rookeries along the way; each untidy raggle-taggle of sticks had one or two rooks perched alongside, all in silhouette against the morning sky. The sun was blazing out of gaps in the clouds like a river of molten silver, so bright. 

I am relieved to discover that today's task for 'The January Cure' was 'clearing out your pantry'. I did that before Christmas - hooray! Yesterday's was creating an 'outbox' - a receptacle for things on their out of the house. That was easy too - an old washing-up was available. I've put a book and a couple of pairs of sock in it. Job done.

It is half past nine at night, and I have been waiting since half past seven for it to be late enough to go to bed. Not long now...

Tuesday 7th January - Goodbyes...and back to normal (ish)

Today was the day of the funeral. It dawned dank and drizzly, but improved as it went on - a gentle sunshine for the actual occasion.

'Are you the celebrant'? er, yes, I suppose that is what I was. On the whole it went well - I have others to confirm my impression. Apart from starting a bit early, so two people slipped in a few minutes late, the ceremony went off more or less as I had intended.

There were buttons that had to be operated, the thought of which had caused a sudden lack of confidence on my part. However proved astonishingly easy to operate, especially when I practised beforehand, starting and stopping music, closing and opening curtains (not that I planned to open the curtains once I had closed them). 

I had a slight frisson when I realised I had nearly forgotten to press the 'close' button for the curtains during that piece of music, and a further scary second or two when I couldn't make it work (the secret is NOT to press the 'close' label, but to press the button BESIDE the label).

As for the flowers, I did the same as at my mother's funeral. The staff had told me that the deer would come and eat them, being very selective as to which flowers they liked. Well, my godmother had had a running battle with deer in her garden and I didn't see why they should win at the last, so I pulled out flowers from the big beautiful spray to make posies for the people who came (very few) and took the rest home. (They told me that it depended on which flowers were used; if the wreath spelled out a word like 'Mum', sometimes the deer would eat everything except 'Mum', sometimes they would only eat the word 'Mum'. Disconcerting.)

I spent the afternoon deconstructing the Christmas wreath (my word, that had been made to withstand a tempest!) and used the flowers for a table decoration, and a vase, and a spring wreath for beside the door.

  
A picture of the Spring Wreath will have to wait until morning. It's dark and drizzly and cold out there now.

I also cleared out a kitchen drawer (It's on a list of houseworkly tasks called 'the January Cure'

Just as well - the base was about to give up the struggle.

Look how tidy the drawer is now, no really, it is MUCH tidier. All the mess is an organised mess.

Cat news; Leo has scratched the top of her head nearly raw, where I put the topical worming treatment. I was a bit horrified when I saw the way she was going at the patch, which explained all the fur lying around everywhere. I quickly washed her head with warm water; to my surprise she thoroughly approved of this and started purring, and hasn't been scratching anything like as much since. 

Tomorrow is a working day. I have packed my school bag with various books of music and will hope for the best. Seven piano pupils in the morning, a whole class full of guitar pupils in the afternoon, and another three or four piano pupils in the evening. I did the planning a while ago - maybe it will come to me as I go along... 

Monday 6th January - ticking the tasks off the list

So, today we accomplished a number of various more or less urgent errands;

The Urgent List

* Himself needed a hair cut - done

* I needed to sort out bits and pieces to do with the bank - done

* Pay for the funeral - done. I'm acting as the 'celebrant', so, today I learned that I will have to be the one who presses the buttons to start and stop the music. It's enough to make me want to bring in my own mp3 player - at least I know how to work it... 
I may bottle out of the curtain-closing button, unless it is a big clearly marked unmistakable effort. All the funerals I have been to have had someone lurking at the back just to work the sound system. 
Oh well. It's a small, intimate occasion. I'm only expecting nine or ten people in total. We'll manage somehow between us, just so long as it doesn't turn into an episode of 'Some Mother's Do Have Them'.  

* Take McCavity the cat to the vet - she had rather alarming symptoms yesterday concerning her back end, and what should and shouldn't be coming out of it. We got an appointment. 
The first suggestion is that maybe she's got worms (so we've wormed her - that was easy as it is drops-on-the-back-of-neck rather than pill-down-the-throat-down-the-throat-down-the-throat; I've never met a cat that can't manage to spit said pill back out half an hour later)
The second suggestion is that it could be a reaction to her arthritis medicine. She's lost a bit of weight, and so may have been receiving a drop or two too much jallop which could make quite a different. So, no more medicine for now.

* Write the 'Eulogy' -done
well, sort of done. First question - what is a eulogy? Ask the internet...

eulogy /ˈjuːlədʒi/  

Learn to pronounce

1. a speech or piece of writing that praises someone or something highly, especially a tribute to someone who has just died.
2. 
   
3. Second question - how long should a eulogy be? Ask the internet again...

   Generally, a eulogy should be around three to five minutes long and take no longer than ten minutes. As to how many words a eulogy should be, that may depend on how fast you deliver them. A funeral eulogy of between 500 and 1000 written words will take from around three and a half to seven and a half minutes to speak.

That's OK then - I've done about 850 words, but don't intend to say all of them.

* Liaise with other family members who are coming - there are only two, my Father, and my Brother. I've emailed the paperwork eg eulogy, and notes on asking which buttons to press to music and curtains to start and stop to my Brother, because if we are delayed, he's going to have to do it all! 'Ah, right, I see...' I don't think he's done this before either.

The Less-Urgent List

I'm not sure what all was on this. 

Things like finishing off the 'Mindless Knitting for Christmas Time' shawl

 

And buying cloves to finish the clove orange 

And finding four books to take to Oxfam, because of receiving four books for Christmas

 

History of Science - mega-heavy paperback, why did we buy it, 20 years ago?, 

The Bookshop by Penelope Lively - a good read, not sure if I'll re-read, 

Death of a Village by M C Beaton - I enjoy her books, set in Plockton, mainly for the memory of the TV series, 

Amazing Uses for Ordinary Things - 1001 uses for Bicarb, or vinegar, or candle wax, and so on and so on... boring, 

In the Steps of St Paul by Morrow - I thought I'd want to re-read this, but haven't and now, 15 years later, I've changed my mind) 

This is a win - five books out!

I've also bought next year's Christmas Cards - how super organised

Finally, I cooked one of the recipes for January in my almanac - and it was very, very, good. Sausages, accompanied by lentils, cooked with onions and carrots and garlic pre-softened in butter, adding wine (I found the remains of some cider) and stock, and once they are cooked through, seasoning with lemon juice, salt and pepper. They were good. But then there are also carrots roasted with halved clementines, salt and pepper and fennel seeds... That was a supper to savour.

 

So far, so good. 

Sunday 5th January - Epiphany

Played the piano in church today - we didn't do 'The Thee Wise Men' as we are on a series of 'Being Grateful' which sounds SO less 'mindful' than 'Gratitude' which is what all the self-help journaling/blogging/self-care books and blog posts and what-have-you is full of these days.

Although, it does appear that looking for things small and even smaller, to be grateful for, does seem to increase one's sense of 'joy', not to be confused with mere 'happiness'.

So here's something I scavenged from facebook;

I'm expecting you all to work your way down the list and then you too can all be joyful. (Joke). (But not entirely).(that is, not entirely joking. Give it a go)

On Friday I met up for lunch with colleagues from one of the schools I teach in. They are mostly teaching assistants at the school, and a couple of ex-teachers. 'What a lovely people all they are', I thought, looking round the table. Endless patience and commitment to the children in their care, and some of the children are fairly tough cookies. One of the reasons I have given up class teaching is because of the tough cookies. I haven't the energy or patience for them any more.

We were meeting at a local garden centre, so while I was there I used a gift card from a student to buy a couple of hellebores (Christmas Roses)

I have treated myself to an Almanac for 2020

as a reward for NOT buying any 'this will make you super organised' planners and notebooks. It says that January is the time to buy and plant Christmas Roses, and you can see what colour the flowers will be. We have a lovely pinkish one at the front of the house. I have put these two down the bottom of the garden next to an over-enthusiastic primrose which came into flower just before Christmas. I thought I had a picture but no, so I will spare you that.

The almanac also informs me that I have missed a meteor shower (3rd and 4th) but there is so much haze and light pollution here that we are lucky to pick out Orion's Belt on a good night, let alone stand in the cold watching for meteors at 4 am. And this month's moon is the Wolf Boon, nad there will be a partial eclipse so when it is full moon we might just see it being a bit pink in colour. Pink Wolves... the mind boggles...

The last few evenings have been very companionable. He sat at one side of the table, and finished the Christmas Present u-gears car,

 and has now transferred his attention to a Christmas Present Wentworth jigsaw. The grey tray is a modified tray-table from Ikea, which he has been working on for the last couple of months in order to be able to fit the jigsaw on the surface. The bottom edge of the tray had to be removed, and a channel cut out, as the top-to-bottom dimension of the jigsaw is a few millimetres greater than the internal dimension of the tray.

Thes jigsaws are cut from real wood, not cardboard, and have little 'whimsy' pieces, cut into shapes of birds and people and so forth. They are a pleasure to handle, but surprisingly difficult.

I sat at the other side, and used up half a jar of cloves and an orange that didn't look as though it was going to be eaten up any time soon to make a clove orange (why? Because they were there.)

That photograph is a bit of a cheat; if I give the orange a twirl, you will see that half a jar isn't quite enough to finish the job. I'll have to buy some more tomorrow.

Now, today, Christmas has been taken down and everything is pretty much as it was three weeks ago.
The removal of the tree has revealed the next job on the list;

We bought these curtains from Marks and Spencers back in about 1981 for our last house. They were lined, but the cotton lining rotted away years and years ago, and now the polyester fabric is disintegrating. Thirty-eight years. I think it is time for new curtains, but that means a new curtain rail... watch this space.

What else? I might be thinking of modifying my New Year's Resolution regarding sending bags of stuff to the charity shop. My uncle had a rule; if he bought anything, then something had to go. Buy a new shirt or book? Discard a shirt or book. He lived in a tiny flat so space was valuable.

I wonder if I can do the same - make it even 2 or more things out, for any new thing in? I received four books over Christmas, and two pens. I'll start with the pens - that was easy; none of these work properly anymore and a local school has a recycling bin which might take them;

Have a good week! 



 












 

Thursday 2nd January - And so the Year begins

Today - the first working day of the year...

And so we did a bit of work, once I had managed to wake up, and have a bath and get dressed and all that palaver of transferring from slumbering person to wide-awake person.

The transformation didn't quite complete, so quite soon, say a couple of hours after the first coffee of the day, I found myself wilting back towards slumber. Lunch, and another coffee has helped.

I've managed to send out a third of the piano lesson invoices for next half of term, and once I have finished procrastinating (oh, did you think I was blogging?) I'll brace myself and send out the rest. If it were just a case of zapping out the invoices that would be that, but I try and sweeten the pill with a bit of a progress report for the pupils and so forth, and it's that, along with double-treble checking that the names on the invoices and the pronouns in the accompanying emails all match, (and they never do first time around) that takes the time.

We, that is Himself and Myself, also went into town and accomplished a few errands this morning. Which means I have been able to cross half-a-dozen items off my list, and also got my head around what needs to be done next.



Tomorrow we shall attempt some more items on the lists - his list, my list and our list.

Meanwhile, I shall make a cup of tea (which I don't really want) as my final procrastinate before I get on with these invoices. I keep telling myself that I will feel so much better once they are all sent off.



It's so tempting to invest in all these planners and notebooks in the hope that they will magically cause organisation to happen...