Piglet - I haven't really said anything up until now, as it feels a bit presumptuous, as I haven't been here long. But what you wrote about your old school exam certificates and D being your music teacher was hugely poignant. I send you all my good wishes....
Thanks very much, Caroline - Ship longevity really doesn't matter a jot, as ISTM we all become virtual friends as soon as we sign up!
I've just seen my sister and niece off on their way, had a little bit of eye leakage (expertly staunched by Quite Large Bear), and am now indulging in Olympic-level procrastination before laundering and rearranging bedlinen.
I may utilise some of the huge stash of CHOCOLATE sent to me by a very kind well-wisher; so far I've been very restrained, but I think Now Might Be The Time ...
I also have a piece of B's excellent lasagne defrosted and ready to go in the oven for supper; with a nice glass of red WINE to go with it, I should be sorted.
These things aren't easy, the one predictable thing is not being able to predict your emotions!
One nasty situation is when you are not thinking of your loss at all and suddenly your surroundings or the task you are working on suddenly reminds you. I think of this as being ambushed.
Yes. And after my mother died I had three nocturnal panic attacks, which I've never had before nor since. (As it happens today was the 45th anniversary of my father's death. I hadn't realised the date until my sister reminded me).
No panic attacks so far, although I've been a bit more jumpy than usual this last week.
Bedlinen now rearranged and laundry in progress, and oven timer about to ping for the lasagne, so I'm off to have some supper. It's not traditional for Thanksgiving (which is today) but I don't particularly like turkey, and who needs tradition anyway?
I say eat the chocolate. You don’t want it still there cluttering up the place when you move .
(After Captain Pyjamas’ extremely premature birth and during his subsequent hospitalisation, kind people came round to console us with chocolate. We literally had so much we didn’t have to buy any for about six months. Which was not a bad problem to have.)
I feel as if I've been on the phone all day: I had a long chat with a friend in Newfoundland this morning, and discovered that a couple I really don't want to see will be in the UK on holiday when I go over next month, so I won't have to give an Oscar-worthy performance of pretending I like them. (They were the engineers of D. losing his job there, but they'd have turned up at the requiem and been all over me like a hot rash. If I never see them again, it'll still be too soon). Apparently they thought I was going back to Scotland with my sister, and were going to try and visit me ...
I can't tell you how happy that made me.
After lunch (avocado on toast, since you ask), a friend called in for a cup of tea and a chat, and after he'd gone, a couple more phone conversations. I suppose now I ought to contemplate making supper - Piglet's Pancetta Pasta, I think.
A friend of mine has a theory that there is a direct correlation between cuteness and tastiness, hence lamb and veal. I can take or leave veal, but am partial to fluffy bunny...
You should have a go at trying to convince a child to eat a chicken which had previously been happily running around your garden...
I’ve just got back from the dental hygienist and now have sparkling teeth. Just having a cup of tea before catching up on some work and then study. I’m teaching this evening so taking it slow.
You should have a go at trying to convince a child to eat a chicken which had previously been happily running around your garden...
We had frinds who named their chickens "Coronation", "Supreme", Maryland", "Madras" and so on. The kids grew up with no illusions.
I knew someone with a lamb named Curry.
My grandmother, who grew up on a farm, said you had to make a point of differentiating between pets and future food. I don't think she ever would have given a name to something she would later eat.
Friends of ours were sheep farmers and we stayed with them once during lambing. They christened one particular lamb "Enormous Norman", and said that he was destined to end up in their freezer!
Friends of ours in Northern Ireland named their dog Caution, so that when they took her for a walk they were exercising Caution.
More Things Have Been Done: for the outlay of a mere $60, the wobbly tap and two dodgy wash-basin plunger-plug-thingies have been mended; the outflow at the bedroom window (which was causing rain to come in) has been cleared; the cupboard under the kitchen sink has been de-moulded and painted; a towel-rail has been affixed to the shower room wall; and the weeds which were infesting the path and top of the drive have been removed.
I was quite gobsmacked: I was expecting to pay plural hundreds. I still need to address the counter top, which got a bit warped when we had the leaky tap in the kitchen, but considering how little I had to pay for the rest, I think it might be worth my while to have the whole top replaced. It's not a huge area, and I'm not proposing to replace it with Italian marble, but a new top would give the whole kitchen a bit of a lift, and they say that nice kitchens are what sell houses.
Oh, and the CD collection* is going this afternoon - to the same old boy who took the magazines.
I'm getting there ...
* except The Best CD Of All Time™ (the Praetorius Christmas Mass) - that's not going anywhere.
Friends of ours in Northern Ireland named their dog Caution, so that when they took her for a walk they were exercising Caution.
Ian Graham-Orlebar, an old-fashioned country Parson who only died a few years ago, had a horse called "Sabbatical" so that, when he was out and someone phoned, they could be told "He's on Sabbatical". He also had - before or after - another horse called "Ministry", so people could truthfully be told that he, like your NI friends, was exercising it. https://tinyurl.com/y3sppnys
@Piglet Well done for all your continuing hard work. How amazing that you got all that work done for $60 - there are some wonderfully able and kind odd job folk around. Good luck with the kitchen top too.
Thanks again, everyone! I've just had a lovely long chat with the lady across the road, who brought in wee buns, bread rolls and cranberry jelly. People are so kind!
I've also had a message from a friend in Belfast asking about David's compositions; there weren't that many of them, but they're rather nice. Although the choir library here has copies of a few anthems, a couple of psalm chants and a set of responses which we sing, I suspect that his other pieces (there weren't that many) have been "tidied" (i.e. dumped), but there might be old copies either in Orkney or in Belfast.
I confess it never occurred to me that they would have been in any of the files we had in the house.
@Piglet I am envious of your $60 bargain - I need something like them to work through my to-do list. Well done for all that you are tackling.
@Heavenlyannie we should both sparkle our teeth as I also had a dental visit this morning. My dentist is in a nearby Big City with both Uni and Cathedral, and today was graduation in the Cathedral, so it was busy with mortar boards being thrown skywards and families dressed up for a celebration.
Today my son became world famous (fleetingly!) as a good Samaritan, after a guy who's wallet he'd found in the road in London, tweeted about the unusual way my son managed to contact him to return the wallet. It went viral and even featured on Australian news https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=3168644933145678&id=114503341893201 I feel suitably proud of him!
I’m tired this morning, having taught online 2 evenings in a row (an online meeting tonight too, though that will be less intensive for me). I’ve got a bit of work today, mostly admin, writing messages in forums and a couple of telephone tutorials. Then i’m going to spend the afternoon doing some study reading if I can stay awake.
It's actually quite scary in a way how quickly this has gone viral. From something that happened yesterday between 2 individuals in London, today he's going to be interviewed by Radio Berkshire, ITV news, possibly radio 1, it's featured on money saving expert.com, and was mentioned on Today programme this morning in 'what the papers say'..apparently it's in Daily Mail and maybe Times too. Might have to suspend my scruples and buy a Mail today as a souvenir!
It's actually quite scary in a way how quickly this has gone viral. From something that happened yesterday between 2 individuals in London, today he's going to be interviewed by Radio Berkshire, ITV news, possibly radio 1, it's featured on money saving expert.com, and was mentioned on Today programme this morning in 'what the papers say'..apparently it's in Daily Mail and maybe Times too. Might have to suspend my scruples and buy a Mail today as a souvenir!
There’s just been a long piece on radio 2 and they interviewed him!
Piglet, keep up the good work, you are doing so very splendidly. I know I did similar things after my husband died last Spring, got rid of various bits of furniture to the family, chucked out rubbish etc, but after the funeral, when everyone had gone, I just went totally floppy, mentally and physically, and just couldn't get anything done. I'm quite a bit older than you, so maybe you will retain your youthful enthusiasm (!), But don't be surprised if life suddenly takes a different turn.
I'm not being negative, and our situations are a bit different, just don't be surprised!!
(((Piglet)))
Thanks, Thomasina - any advice I can get will be very welcome.
I'm so far having a very lazy day: I slept until about 10 o'clock (is it normal to be able to sleep really well in these circumstances?), and I've done bugger-all except sweep up the weeds from the path that the handyman strimmed yesterday.
There's a bloke coming about counter-tops in about an hour, and a counsellor from the undertakers' later this afternoon, but I really ought to do something constructive while I wait, like firing up the computer and beginning to type address labels for sending thank-you cards ...
@Gracious Rebel - I swallowed my pride and clicked on a Daily Fail link to read your son's story too - what an ingenious thing to do!
It's such a glorious day, I really ought to go for an amble; I went up to the letter-boxes earlier to collect my post, but didn't go any further, but I should take advantage of the weather - it can't last much longer!
I've just checked the forecast, and we're apparently getting wind and rain tomorrow - thank you Mr. Trump.
Piglet I am touched that in the midst of all the grief and mess you are going through, you have found time and inclination to show interest in something so 'trivial', as my son's story.
"Trivial" (but not to the bloke whose wallet it was!) things are very good for me - a welcome distraction!
Counter-top bloke didn't turn up, which was a bummer, but the lady from the undertakers was quite helpful - most of her advice was about practical and financial things, and things I probably wouldn't have thought of.
She was quite encouraging too; I may be entitled to things I mightn't have expected.
On a completely different subject, in the hope of providing a laugh, may I tell you a little story?
My dear friend B has a severely disabled daughter who lives in a care home. When B turned up for her regular visit this week, she saw a van in the car park, signwritten 'PetPals'. Oh good, she thought, someone's brought a dog or a cat, or perhaps even a rabbit, to show the residents.
It turned out to be a very large, very woolly, sheep. Called Dee*
Wearing a nappy.
Her daughter was deeply unimpressed but B quite took to Dee, who allowed herself to be petted quite cheerfully. Sadly B is the last person left in the world whose phone is not also a camera, because I would have paid good money for that photograph. The Intrepid Grandson and I often joke about putting the sheep in nappies, so you don't have to do the sheep poo dance through the village.
* Mr S, for reasons of his own, calls all sheep Deirdre.
I have a photo of me with a couple of petting sheep. It wasn’t in a care home, though their owner told me that’s where he often takes them, but in a local park (I live in London). They were in the back of his car and it was a bit of a surprise when he opened the hatch and they popped out. I assume he put them in nappies when he visits places. My mum’s care home has all sorts of animals visit including snakes and spiders.
A friend of mine keeps a few sheep to provide raw material for her hobby of spinning and weaving. One lamb was rejected by its mother and had to be bottle-fed. It spent more time with human beings than with other sheep. When it got older, my friend sold it to a petting zoo. It was a perfect match.
Comments
I've just seen my sister and niece off on their way, had a little bit of eye leakage (expertly staunched by Quite Large Bear), and am now indulging in Olympic-level procrastination before laundering and rearranging bedlinen.
I may utilise some of the huge stash of CHOCOLATE sent to me by a very kind well-wisher; so far I've been very restrained, but I think Now Might Be The Time ...
I also have a piece of B's excellent lasagne defrosted and ready to go in the oven for supper; with a nice glass of red WINE to go with it, I should be sorted.
That's one of the things I'm looking forward to: you don't have to shovel wind.
One nasty situation is when you are not thinking of your loss at all and suddenly your surroundings or the task you are working on suddenly reminds you. I think of this as being ambushed.
Bedlinen now rearranged and laundry in progress, and oven timer about to ping for the lasagne, so I'm off to have some supper. It's not traditional for Thanksgiving (which is today) but I don't particularly like turkey, and who needs tradition anyway?
(After Captain Pyjamas’ extremely premature birth and during his subsequent hospitalisation, kind people came round to console us with chocolate. We literally had so much we didn’t have to buy any for about six months. Which was not a bad problem to have.)
I feel as if I've been on the phone all day: I had a long chat with a friend in Newfoundland this morning, and discovered that a couple I really don't want to see will be in the UK on holiday when I go over next month, so I won't have to give an Oscar-worthy performance of pretending I like them. (They were the engineers of D. losing his job there, but they'd have turned up at the requiem and been all over me like a hot rash. If I never see them again, it'll still be too soon). Apparently they thought I was going back to Scotland with my sister, and were going to try and visit me ...
I can't tell you how happy that made me.
After lunch (avocado on toast, since you ask), a friend called in for a cup of tea and a chat, and after he'd gone, a couple more phone conversations. I suppose now I ought to contemplate making supper - Piglet's Pancetta Pasta, I think.
I’ve just got back from the dental hygienist and now have sparkling teeth. Just having a cup of tea before catching up on some work and then study. I’m teaching this evening so taking it slow.
We had frinds who named their chickens "Coronation", "Supreme", Maryland", "Madras" and so on. The kids grew up with no illusions.
I knew someone with a lamb named Curry.
My grandmother, who grew up on a farm, said you had to make a point of differentiating between pets and future food. I don't think she ever would have given a name to something she would later eat.
(I miss our old ROTFLMAO emoji.)
More Things Have Been Done: for the outlay of a mere $60, the wobbly tap and two dodgy wash-basin plunger-plug-thingies have been mended; the outflow at the bedroom window (which was causing rain to come in) has been cleared; the cupboard under the kitchen sink has been de-moulded and painted; a towel-rail has been affixed to the shower room wall; and the weeds which were infesting the path and top of the drive have been removed.
I was quite gobsmacked: I was expecting to pay plural hundreds. I still need to address the counter top, which got a bit warped when we had the leaky tap in the kitchen, but considering how little I had to pay for the rest, I think it might be worth my while to have the whole top replaced. It's not a huge area, and I'm not proposing to replace it with Italian marble, but a new top would give the whole kitchen a bit of a lift, and they say that nice kitchens are what sell houses.
Oh, and the CD collection* is going this afternoon - to the same old boy who took the magazines.
I'm getting there ...
* except The Best CD Of All Time™ (the Praetorius Christmas Mass) - that's not going anywhere.
Puts me in mind of the parrot named Onan, because he spilled his seed.
You're doing well with all your sorting, Piglet.
I've also had a message from a friend in Belfast asking about David's compositions; there weren't that many of them, but they're rather nice. Although the choir library here has copies of a few anthems, a couple of psalm chants and a set of responses which we sing, I suspect that his other pieces (there weren't that many) have been "tidied" (i.e. dumped), but there might be old copies either in Orkney or in Belfast.
I confess it never occurred to me that they would have been in any of the files we had in the house.
@Heavenlyannie we should both sparkle our teeth as I also had a dental visit this morning. My dentist is in a nearby Big City with both Uni and Cathedral, and today was graduation in the Cathedral, so it was busy with mortar boards being thrown skywards and families dressed up for a celebration.
I’m tired this morning, having taught online 2 evenings in a row (an online meeting tonight too, though that will be less intensive for me). I’ve got a bit of work today, mostly admin, writing messages in forums and a couple of telephone tutorials. Then i’m going to spend the afternoon doing some study reading if I can stay awake.
Now, off for nice brisk walk to wake up.
@Heavenlyannie Hope you had a nice walk, and good luck with your work this afternoon...
There’s just been a long piece on radio 2 and they interviewed him!
👏🏼
I'm not being negative, and our situations are a bit different, just don't be surprised!!
(((Piglet)))
I'm so far having a very lazy day: I slept until about 10 o'clock (is it normal to be able to sleep really well in these circumstances?), and I've done bugger-all except sweep up the weeds from the path that the handyman strimmed yesterday.
There's a bloke coming about counter-tops in about an hour, and a counsellor from the undertakers' later this afternoon, but I really ought to do something constructive while I wait, like firing up the computer and beginning to type address labels for sending thank-you cards ...
@Gracious Rebel - I swallowed my pride and clicked on a Daily Fail link to read your son's story too - what an ingenious thing to do!
It's such a glorious day, I really ought to go for an amble; I went up to the letter-boxes earlier to collect my post, but didn't go any further, but I should take advantage of the weather - it can't last much longer!
I've just checked the forecast, and we're apparently getting wind and rain tomorrow - thank you Mr. Trump.
Counter-top bloke didn't turn up, which was a bummer, but the lady from the undertakers was quite helpful - most of her advice was about practical and financial things, and things I probably wouldn't have thought of.
She was quite encouraging too; I may be entitled to things I mightn't have expected.
My dear friend B has a severely disabled daughter who lives in a care home. When B turned up for her regular visit this week, she saw a van in the car park, signwritten 'PetPals'. Oh good, she thought, someone's brought a dog or a cat, or perhaps even a rabbit, to show the residents.
It turned out to be a very large, very woolly, sheep. Called Dee*
Wearing a nappy.
Her daughter was deeply unimpressed but B quite took to Dee, who allowed herself to be petted quite cheerfully. Sadly B is the last person left in the world whose phone is not also a camera, because I would have paid good money for that photograph. The Intrepid Grandson and I often joke about putting the sheep in nappies, so you don't have to do the sheep poo dance through the village.
* Mr S, for reasons of his own, calls all sheep Deirdre.
Mrs. S, who even dreamt about sheep last night
I'll see myself out...