5 OS Pleasures in your Day Today part 2

mineallmine

After watching the news, this is definitely an OS pleasure:-
1. Having a safe, dry, warm roof over our heads

Broomstick

Evening.

(((((Hugs))))) from me too, Pk.

My five for Tuesday:

1. Another trip to the dump with more recycling and to the charity shop with a sack load of stuff.

2. Made DS1 a bag to hang from his pirate belt (I reckoned pirates need somewhere to put their mobile phones!). It was all a bit improvised but I think I've accidentally come up with a design that I could sell.

3. Rediscovered a plain silk shirt I bought 20 years ago whose colour goes really well with a jumper I wear a lot nowadays so it feels like I've acquired a brand new garment to wear.

4. Had to have a meal out in a situation not of my choosing but the food was good and it's meant that we didn't have any washing up this evening. :T The kitchen is looking really clean. We've been having a blitz on getting the house back in shape.

5. Wonderful skies round here as I was driving late afternoon and a huge orange moon low on the horizon when the sun had set.

Sweet dreams
B x

PS mineallmine, so true. That's a big blessing.

Frith

Hope you are OK, PK.

TILAMS - the ex OH is a BTE hearing aid wearer and said the first fortnight is the worst (while you break them in). Apart from that, don't wade out into the sea then get hit in the side of the head by a large wave... He was already grumpy on that holiday before being unable to hear on one side!

Here are my 5 or so for today.

Went to London!

1) Got the train we wanted to catch at some ungodly hour with a bit of unwanted running to get there.

2) Went to the National Gallery. We may hold the record for the quickest look round ever (thanks to sons) but I did see Van Gogh's "Sunflowers" and other well known works.

3) Sons loved Trafalgar Square and the lions.

4) Went to Harrods. I think the main escalator bit is supposed to look sumptuous and plush but it is so gaudy now that it reminds me of the inside of Blackpool Tower!

5) Found the number 11 bus so went as far as it goes and saw St Pauls etc.

6) Got lost but eventually found a tube station and went to Westminster. Smaller son was desparate to see Big Ben so we climbed the stairs out of Westminster Station and started to cross the bridge there and he looked up and there it was! :-)

Terrible journey home though. I asked a few times where the Hereford train was or which platform it would leave from and no one knew til the last minute and it was packed. Sons refuse to sit next to "dodgy people" but wanted to sit at a table to play cards (this at Reading, when the world and his wife got off and there were some seats!)

So they sat on one side of the table and I sat the other, next to the dodgy man. Dodgy man proceeded to get his laptop out with headphones (thank goodness) and watch a film next to me that got more and more "adult" in content. :eek: I was trying to play cards with sons and not watch the film but it was quite stressful. What a weirdo to want to watch a film like that with strangers around you!

Anyway, back home now and considering watching Holby City.

Kittikins

Glad you had a great time in London Frith I'm going up there today for a short dull training course (redundancy related) and am going to have loads of free time afterwards. Think I'll go and do some sightseeing rather than window shopping, you've inspired me!

Chickenopolis

Good morning all !

PK - ((hugs)) don't beat yourself up x

Sparrer - I do hope that you are not over doing it xx

OT-done ! that sounds a fair exchange to me x

VJsmum- no sadly I am "not allowed" to do anything I did in my "old life" . Have cervical(neck not female part) laminectomies so neck could break if I even sneeze too hard.... and I hate fish:rotfl:Like the name though .. I will order it just to say it You sound house wifey today, I'd love to be at home but I earn all the bucks , until my neck eventually does snap that is

Frith - Dodgy bloke must get off on it . I would have said something because I can't help myself ..like "do you have to watch that in order to learn some skills because you are carp in the sack?" in a very loud voice .

Kittikins - you are up early!

Have a good day all !

ampersand

Yes, I saw you were up early kittikins - I was too, but not typing.
pk- you can do what you can do, no more. Your Dad will know this, too and of himself.
Frith - you did London for you and you've made a stand-out remembering day. Hearing the limitations of the Sistine Chapel these days makes your time in the National more than OK.
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Today:
http://www.saint-dicton.com
[I'll put each day's up from now on - always read by me, ditto my printed Almanach du Facteur]. I allowed myself to start a Martin Walker on bus yesterday, so am drawn back into la France Profonde again, never truly absent..

1. Wasn't going to post for a bit. Wary of tracking hour-by-hour stages of grim anniversary through R's mind and my own and somehow depositing it here. Usually I clear well away somewhere. BUT, committments this week and Spits tmrw make this impossible. Instead I went early, bus pass-wise, to consign sth - valuation and/or auction. There, saw M! Goodness me!- an always elegantly coiffed, jewelled, dressy older lady. 'Did you know S was in Addenbrookes?' asked she. No, I didn't. I've known him many years. They're a long-standing partnership and near-couple. En bref, she had just come from him - a very, very rapid rundown is happening. I suggested we have a coffee, if she had time. Kind[and top-notch]valuer, clearly esteeming M, interceded and said he could bring us coffees/bics, should we wish, and we could have the little[and lovely]room, which we shortly did after our business. I learnt that not only is she facing the same 12th anniversary, on the same date, but that the true love of her Life was, as mine, also 22 years older. How often, how surprisingly, must unsuspected commonalties link us to others? We talked, or rather I let her do so. Parallels and close similarities abounded and that's enough to say about all of that.

2. Yesterday was sunny, all day long - not forecast.

3. Sat beside a gentle and genteel lady on bus who'd watched, as had I, a feral toddler whose Mum was interested only in texting, phoning, shouting expletives at child to blame her for everything wrong in her life. We'd hesitantly but mutually despaired, intervening 3 times when child hurled a drink bottle in the road and ran out after it. This is the heart of Cambridge, busy street, busy taxi, busy bus ways. I learned she is Lithuanian/Armenian, an electronics engineer, architect husband, one son born when she was 40 - 'very late' - and they arrived 5 years ago, with no English. She is a lunchtime lady at a Primary school now. Her husband stacks shelves/delivers grox. They came to make 'a different start, for our son to be free to learn'. He is being mentored, but they are -all 3- wise and will let him take his time to choose, be it Maths or Classics. Son is already spotted for a Cambridge place. If only I could do her justice and convey the modesty and shy musicality of her speech and manner. When she spoke of relatives, possibly in France, I at once asked 'Valence?' and we then spoke French for the rest of the journey. There is a strong Armenian enclave there, as I found last year. When I gave S's name, she gave a deep smile....a beautiful lady.

4. Found self returning by odd route, so quickly alit at the Fitzwilliam. Really intended most of yesterday to be Spits prep. as I'm out-to-lunch much of today. [Somehow that will get done...] But, as I was there, given the day, the date, the thoughts...it can only be good to wander through from one front end to the other and out into street again. Special attention to the stunning silver displays by the shop. One modern shallow bowl is beyond beautiful, with rippling organic swirls of iridescent enamelling in pollen dustings like butterfly wings.
Then to the Korean ceramics, a small adjacent room with much celadon, a glaze I love. These ewers, dishes, small bowls, pouring flasks, plates of great ancient delicacy are fine and restrained quiet things, not wearing for one moment their one thousand years.

5. Edam moon, a rounded glow - beautiful and kinder last night. The light cast on my outdoor vase made simple loveliness from a night-dark kitchen.

6. Stayed on 5 again:-)...oh, dd - didn't hear Matt /James, so will catch up. Must remember to confirm Spits place too.

VJsmum

Frith - oh dear, I'm sure that was distressing but your telling of it did make me chuckle.

Chicken - apologies, I forgot about your neck / back thing. Well I didn't do it either so I have no idea if you are missing out! Have a lovely time.

Ampersand - what a beautifully written, melancholic post. I am not trying to make light of what was clearly a tough day for you - sometimes we must be blessed that we can remember and, hopefully, smile. I am starting to get to that point after losing my mum now - remembering and smiling and not so much the terrible pain of loss. Starting to..

ampersand

Thankyou vjm - it's a few days, body not found at once. I was tearing around the countryside, trying to think, shouting at the moon 'Where are you? Where have you gone?' and then there's a sense of failure at guessing all the wrong places...only to think later how wryly wrong THE place deliberately was. Spits demain will be good for me and today will concentrate on L's and C's loss over lunch, rather than mine, again good, for them too, as a curtain down.
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Right, going now.

sparrer

Thanks Chicken, I'm trying to keep moving or there's a fluid build up and breathing becomes a tad difficult! I think you're pretty amazing, I have a friend with cervical laminectomies and wish she could just be grateful for what she can still do rather than complaining all the time. Your attitude seems to be very much like mine, it has to live with me, not the other way around

ampersand thinking of you.

Frith sounds like a super day for you all. Well done for coming between the w*nker and the boys, so it wasn't spoiled for them

PK your DF knows how much you care, he understands you are doing the best you can do x

Just had a phone call from the garage, the service/MoT is going to cost over £500 :eek:. I'll really have to scratch around to find it by the end of today but I've been lucky the past few years so shouldn't complain (but no doubt will have a good grumble to myself anyway ).

Have a sunny day

Tealady_2

Morning

Frith - Sounds like you had a great day in London, we have also done the speed test of the National Gallery. I have found that I will pick out a small portion of one of the museums to see at a time and that usually works. As for the dodgy man on the train, words fail me at the behaviour of some people:mad:

Ampersand - Sending gentle hugs your way

Sparrer - Get well now

Pleasures for yesterday,
1. Picked up a couple of boxes of free cereal :money:and a fruit snack for DD.
2. Statement of annual bank charges came in the post was less than £1.50. What a difference to years past when it would have made very scary reading (in fact wouldn't have read it just hid it).
3. Packed lunches and breakfasts for everyone again, getting quite good at this just need to make sure keep it up.
4. OH and DD didn't fancy the Cottage Pie that was on the meal plan and as I hadn't been organised and made it dinner was converted to a chilli which everyone enjoyed.
5. Getting the dreaded quarterly billing done at work was so much easier this month as now have all the information available. Boss thinks it is a really difficult job which is was to start but now quite easy but will let him think it is still really hard to do;)

Hugs to all who need them