5 OS Pleasures in your Day Today part 2

ampersand

Whatever esprit de merde inhabits this 'putah has repeatedly timed its putsch with my resumption on this Thread.....wiping it out. This has happened 4x since a feeblish return after crimbo...page just does a slow, bottom-up white out, which I am powerless to stem. All pms went, too and remain lost. Sometimes, mse itself has refused to open. Given certain fragilities, some of these malfaisances have felt very apt.

It's easily felt like a 'too soon' sign and I do feel this way still, but will try again.

A selection, therefore, of recent things as they come to mind.

1. Spent crimbo away with someone to whom I commended mse a year ago and think I was useful. A family in deep tragedy and an alteration no-one would ever wish on another. Any reader who may recall this lady should know she is courageously re-making her life, working her way through a PGCE, then to teach.
2. I was a relentless nit-picking critic of her essays and evaluations, due 12 Jan. We both knew it was an absolutely right and necessary discipline and revelled in it. Academic rigour is my joy and this exercise also served me: a long-redundant, much-needed tonic. I promise you that 'pupil' is in one piece and massively grateful.
3. No cancer - definite.
4. Have somehow come through a 1st year of Then and Now....the re-living is not easier, but lessens? numbs? dulls? beds down?...don't know exactly, but I'm here.
5. Reverbe's are so thin on ground now...but 4 yesterday! 2 pennies shining at town bus terminal[sparrer remembers where], 20p outside my Bank, £1 in the only available trolley in shop, which I returned and chained to the bar - out popped the coin! Took it to cash desk. 'Keep it' said sweet girl who knew I'd just bought a £2 pair of very unusual purple silk trousers and another £3 pair of incredible [can't describe] Gloria Swanson style, silver grey, undulating, almost liquid doeskin-feeling, swirling, stunningly tailored ones, with piped long seams. Must choose which to wear on anniversaire.
6.[starting back with my usual sort of 5, plus ça change...] Dinner next Tuesday with gay male friends.......at last, after 54 years of longing, my means of properly learning mah-jong will be M's very capable partner. OH1 gave me a fine old ivory set[1969 wedding present] which I've somehow retained as I've travelled the world. It's under my bed now and I'll be taking it mardi soir.
7. In my constant part- français life, a gloriously felicitous library find is one Martin O'Brien[former long-term Travel Editor for Vogue] writing crime novels in places I know and love utterly, utterly...as, so patently, does he. I suspect that Patrick O'Brien was his Pa, to whom a 2006 title is dedicated. This 'Jacquot' novel was next on my list. A fortnight ago, in Blessed £land, there stood 4 Signed 1st Editions on the shelf..still can't believe it. He writes as one for whom the device of novel is necessary to cloak or excuse his accurate, lyrical, original voicing of these people, these places, these darknesses and the eternal Truths abounding both. As you may gather, I am Phanne:D
7. The godsend that is i-player as my companion, mostly The Wireless, through these last times. I have this afternoon's play to look forward to - written for Billy Connolly and Brian Cox!
8. Carol Ann Duffy's poem for Stephen Lawrence, in today's Guardian:
Carol Ann Duffy
guardian.co.uk, Friday 6 January 2012 22.55 GMT
Article history
Cold pavement indeed
the night you died,
murdered;
but the airborne drop of blood
from your wound
was a seed
your mother sewed
into hard ground –
your life's length doubled,
unlived, stilled,
till one flower, thorned,
bloomed
in her hand,
love's just blade.
......and it seems more than fit that as I close, a Profile programme about the remarkable Imran Khan[no, not that one], solicitor for an equally remarkable Doreen Lawrence, has just begun on R4.

Blessings to you all: those who seek work, those coming through or enduring illness and upheaval, those who have new lives to celebrate, those who have exciting changes and new rooftops ahead - let's all salute 2012 as a truly new, shiny, nothing's-too-good-for-us year. Leap Year Ladies?
[Some lurking has kept me reasonably up to date]

Chickenopolis

Good evening all!

millie - welcome back ! It sounds as if you had a lovely time - glad to hear the critters are ok too x

Ladyhawk - I am glad that the new editon to your family has had a safe albeit scary arrival x good luck with the offer !

5 for today

1. A glorious sunny warm (?!) day here , with clear blue skies .

2. Washing dried on the line by about 2pm , unbelievable for January

3. It would have been a crime not to be in the garden getting some vitamin D . OH replaced the plastic cover on one of my cloches with some old netting that we had forgotten that we had. Operation cat poo 2012 is now under way - as the cloche had been ripped to pieces and the obvious was starting to happen. I am pleased as not a penny was spent "replacing " it and the frame did not end up in the bin..

4. Due to no 4. I have just started to get in to the gardening book I brought last year " the edible garden" , and due to my 4 day week I can dedicate more time to the veg. garden in theory :rotfl:

5. NSD - made some broccoli and stilton soup for lunch and a sort of Thai Dahl for tea- made with coconut milk ( not the whole tin.. way too expensive!) , chilli and a teeny tiny butternut squash from the garden that had escaped the hens .

I didn't sleep very well as I am not used to the mattress yet and it feels like I am sleeping in a strange hotel bed :rotfl:OH has also got in to the habit of having "a four o'clock snore " (a.m ) So I am off to bed to read in a moment ,... because I can:D

Have a good evening all x

eta -Welcome back ampersand - you have been missed . Your No.3 - fantastic news . I hope that you are feeling better ?

Broomstick

Glad you got back safely Millie.

Happy anniversary Kittikins.

I've been in all day and feel completely shattered (could be connected) so finding five things is a bit of a struggle:

1. Had text from DS1 who was sounding cheerful.

2. Good chat with friend on phone.

3. Got through some boring work even though I didn't feel much like it.

4. Two cups of hot chocolate

5. Another NSD and NPD.

Am going to go and carry on with some work in bed, I think. Then early night for me tonight.

Sleep well.

B x

katholicos

Hmm, today is going to be a toughie to find 5 pleasures as so many things have happened that are not good, but i will find 5. I will!

1. Earl grey tea, my little treat.

2. Bread machines which turn out gorgeous loaves of bread in less than 2 hours.

3. Dvd box sets.

4. My bed.

5. Hot water bottles!

skintmum2012

Hi everyone sorry I have not been posting My son dropped my laptop on the floor the other day and broke my USB thing that hooks me up to the Web so had to wait for hubby to fix it. here are mine

1: Had HM bread and HM chicken Soup for lunch was yummy

2: We had Chicken Curry from the slow cooker for dinner my first ever Rubber Chicken I can't believe I used to serve up the roast dinner then bin the chicken afterwards after seening all the chicken that's come off and how far it's gone

3: Had a very small spend day 3 day in a row

4: We started sorting out the spare bedroom to move my daughter into it

5: I just found a really good sale and put everything into my basket to buy only to close the site before I could and spend nothing yay

Millie2008_2

Thanks for all the welcome backs:) whilst I feel quite sad, it will be nice to get back into a routine.

I have been trying hard to catch up with everything that's been going on and while it has been going in, lack of sleep has rendered me incapable of addressing everyone individually as I had hoped, so sorry about that

Buuut tomorrow is another day and I am looking forward to animal cuddles, mucking out, washing, cooking comfort fodder, crafting and raiding the Xmas chocs. Much as I have enjoyed living the high life for a week, I have craved the OSness that so many people (including some I have met this week) would never appreciate. We are very lucky, peeps

Right, bed time, before I start spouting even more Millie nonsense xx

VJsmum

Welcome back Millie and Ampersand - great news.
Congratulations Auntie Ladyhawk
Hugs to those who need them

FOr today
1. A wanton soak in the bath finishing reading "the girl with the dragon tattoo"
2. Loads of clutter got rid of in study, some put aside for OH to decide and some for ebay and "reverbe"'d £1.20 in English and over £5 in foreign! :T
3. Watched Criminal minds with DD and knitted
4. OH and DS had a lovely day at the footie, we lost but we weren't anihilated and the team got a standing ovation apparently
5.Luvverly YS curry for tea - another hole made in the freezer.

Kittikins

Welcome back Ampersand, so happy to read your no. 3 and to see you back amongst us. Big hugs x

Katholicos - hope tomorrow is a better day and that your bed is a place of comfort and refuge from the not good things x

Not a great day so a bit of a struggle to get to 5.

1. My evening plans changed completely today - with OH being ill, my heart wasn't really in going out to see bands with people I don't particularly know, then DD's friend's baby sister turned out not to be 100% well so I didn't think it fair to send DD there (for her or my friends' sake as having more children to look after when the baby is ill isn't a great idea), and my chum sounded like she wasn't that enthusiastic about a night out either, so I made the decision to have a girls' night out with DD instead. We went to the cinema and then for pizza (voucher for pizza). The night out was free as....

2. I won some money in a raffle and it, and my monthly cashback from my credit card will pay for the whole event

3. DD and I had a lazy morning, cuddling, watching a DVD, and having a bath

4. Scrummy lunch of baked potato and salad

5. Lovely chat with mummykins on the phone

scotrae

Long time no see! It's been a while since I checked this thread out but I see it's the same one - just a few hundred pages longer!
Not sure if anyone remembers me but I've had a mad few months - not the best of health and a relatively recent diagnosis of MS. So appreciating OS pleasures seems more relevant than ever now.
Mine for today:
1/Caught up with old friends who'd arranged to call in (I'd forgotten they were coming so part of the pleasure was relief that they arrived minutes before we were going shopping!);
2/Got lots of nice whoopsied bargains and some very cheap festive nibbles with the groceries;
3/Used £12 off £60 spend voucher at the big supermarket - (the first time I've made it around there for months and the last for a while if i can help it!) - and given 10% voucher for next time at the smaller supermarket;
4/Made a rather nice chicken dish with whoopsied chicken and whoopsied creme fraiche;
5/Hubby snuggled up to me on the sofa with a nice furry throw I was given yesterday - and fell asleep against me. Ahhhh ---- bliss!

Scotrae x

Kittikins

Hugs scotrae, lovely to see you back x