A bit of a pickle

 I was so excited. It was to be a great week with three old friends who I used to work with in Singapore. I was so excited that I started packing my bags a whole week before my trip to Norfolk. Who wouldn't? Just imagine us - four women - all foot loose, fancy free and always up for a G&T. What could go wrong? What could there be not to like?

A bad weather wefi

The plans were to take enough food for our own breakfasts and then do one meal each. Easy - except I think we all overdid the food and the drinks. I kept adding to my list thinking it would be a good idea to bring an extra bit of this and a bit of that. I bought one of my homemade pickle jars. This was not a good idea. On the journey the vinegar escaped the jar, seeped through my bag and soaked everything. The bag is still damp but doesn't smell too bad. Not too bad a pickle! 

Our first night together was an international competition - pictionary and table football - with a victory to England! Yay. I think we won with the aid of negronis! Were we truly pickled? Sammi phoned up and probably decided that Mumsie would probably talk more sense another time. Eric, the horse cropped up in conversation along with some other cock and bull. In fact, Eric stayed with us for most of the trip.

When we visited my cousin's place the following day, she mentioned that her dog, Eric, died. It is always sad when a furry, family friend departs. We laughed. We felt embarrassed and contrite. Eric the horse  - such a silly joke - of course there isn't a whisky called Eric. Why should the name Eric make us giggle? God Knows. Silly jokes have since abounded. Having seen signs for dressed crab all over the area, we have since learnt that when crab is dressed, it wears a shell suit - thank you Catrina - a 90s joke!

So as you can see, the holiday had settled into a sublime sense of the ridiculous pretty quickly. I get the blame for being an early riser and clomping around. I take it on the chin. Apparently I wake the others up by making them a cuppa and emptying the dishwasher. All the time I thought I was being helpful. I also drove us through torrential rain and floods by a very circuitous route for our first day out. I actually felt really stressed. Water coming across the road in a torrent above the height of the door is truly scary! Luckily, my good old jalopy kept pushing on just like chitty chitty bang bang. We did most of what we set out to do despite the weather.

Walsingham

What remains of Walsingham Abbey

Being tossed around on the high seas in search of seals booked by a Seale

Stormy skies

Wells- far-too-far-from-the-sea

Wells - I see no sea!

Binham Priory

Norfolk flatness

We have visited seals on a boat trip, eaten fish and chips on a quay and lost house keys. They weren't lost. They were in Margy's spare shoes in the boot of the car. Who would have thought it? I even hurt my back in search of these wretched things! 

So now the holiday whizzed its way to an end. There'll be no more jokes about Little Snoring and Great Snoring, Prior Snoring (A real person!) and Post Snoring (not a real person). We all reckon it has been far too short. The time slipped through our fingers. The gin slipped down our necks and the humour flowed freely. As with all good teams, we found our place and did the sort of things that needed to be done to support each other. There will remain memories of the jigsaw, pictionary cheats, and some things that definitely won't get shared. As they say, what happens in Norfolk, stays in Norfolk!

Roll on next holiday!

Another effin disaster and other miseries

Hey ho, shit happens. There was I doing my bit for the world by covering short trips around where I live on my bike when my front tyre went flat yet again. I was nearly 3 miles from home and it was raining the sort of rain that runs down your back and makes you thoroughly soaked. I slunk back along the canal muttering expletives and wishing I had popped out in my car instead. errr. My trainers squelched. I couldn't feel more miserable.

When I got home my bike was covered in mud so I put plastic sheeting down and hung my bike up so it wouldn't drip on the hall floor. I hated that bike. I hated the weather. I was more than miffed it had got yet another puncture. I dried myself, wrapped up in comfy clothes and poured a big sympathy drink. My nextdoor neighbour wrote on FB that he had just got caught in the downpour so I replied. We live in adjoining houses and we were having a public commiseration about being bedraggled. How funny!

I think of FB as being a link to the whole world so chatting to someone in my little village through this medium amused me. In any day, I could chat with friends from NZ, Asia, Europe or outer space - perhaps not outer space but you get the point. I see FB as my link to the wider world and to me it is a happy sort of place - even if I am bringing down the tone by moaning about the weather. 

The weather has been particularly wet all week. We haven't had the red warnings that Scotland has but we have had daily rain so this has been a week without tennis. I have done little jobs instead. The inner tube has been repaired but I do need to get a new tyre. A thorn left a hole in the tread. I have now amassed quite a collection of inner tubes in various states of road worthiness. My ability to change tyres hasn't improved despite the practice. I am still quite slow.

I am also annoyed with my local doctor's. Last September I put a request in for more strong pain killers through the web porthole. No response. I put in another request. No repsonse again so I cycled to the surgery where the secretary told me the prescription was fulfilled at the time of the request. How was I to know.? A bit of communication wouldn't have gone amiss. 

So with the weather depressing me, the cost of basics still rising faster than the Weimar Repbulic and the radio no longer being my friend: life isn't rosy. I have taken to shouting at intransigent Israeli representatives refusing to answer questions about humanitarian issues in Gaza. I am shouting at British politcians who support the IDF in its war crimes. I can't believe that half the people who are interviewed can truly believe what they are spouting. It is all too woke. 

Too top it all, I set off on my recently repaired bike only to realise my trainer dampness had seeped through my socks. The outside weather is now 5c - normal for this time of the year. I just need to wear the right clothes for outside conditions... this is more difficult than it seems.

I shall drown just one more wine and look forward to a little trip to Norflok with three other wonderful people this week. Maybe my world isn't that gloomy. Are you listening to me? 

Nailing my colours firmly to the mast

In for a penny, as they say.  The opinionated, lesser half of me is taking a stand on a number of issues this week. First and foremost I stand firmly on the side of cyclists however  slow they and late they may make me when they struggle up the windy lanes while I sit in my car waiting for the ideal opportunity to safely overtake. My sympathy is with them. I too have been that person holding back a line of traffic. They are doing good for themselves and for the world. I am happy to wait. I support their efforts.  I am not a patient person as many can testify but in this instance I can sit tight. 

Not only do I get held up by the weekend cyclists though; on Saturday it was horses, a horse box, a tractor and three different groups of cyclists all ambling along the lanes between my home and the tennis club. In fact, my son almost persuaded me to get an electric bike so that I could pedal to tennis 8 and a 1/2 miles across country. It is not a bad idea. My major concern is the extra weight of carrying an elctric bike if needed. The other niggle is if I go for electric will I get too lazy to pedal?

So cyclists are on my good list and so is Roger Waters. He has vlogged a very impassioned plea to bring an end to the slaughter in the Palestine conflict. For me, when a country has been boxed in with high fences by its neighbour, had land illegally taken and has suffered inhumane treatment for half a century it is hardly surprising that they have reacted. It is sad that ordinary Israeli people have lost their lives but the repsonse of  the Israeli government in retaliation intends to flatten and destroy a whole country is a war crime. 

No wonder Jewish people in the UK fear local reprisals. They should. The news in my country is biased. My government is supporting Israeli in its war crimes. It is an offence in the UK to wave a Palestinian flag. Thousands marched this weekend in many cities in the UK in support of Palestine. News propaganda has no place in this country despite our governments best efforts to squash our voices.  I wonder what would happen to me - a little old dear - if I were to wave one in a public place. Perhaps the answer will come in another blog!

The IDF should tremble in fear. I have a grand daughter who is potentially a weapon of mass destruction. She managed to lock Shadow and Mum out of the house last week. I was not on hand to help and in the end the fire brigade were called. If we could point her in the right direction, she would cause havoc and devastation almost anywhere. We love her for it too.

One final thought; we often find solace at the bottom of a bottle and this is not good for us. One tennis friend dropped a bottle of gin on his foot. Until I heard this I always thought of gin as a harmless drink. Maybe I have nailed my colours to the wrong mast after all.

What is Wrong

 Where do you start? What is wrong with me - lots! What is wrong with the world - an endless list! We have lived through the hottest September on record and now we are heading for the hottest October as well. Playing tennis has been a joy and in light clothes I even get sweaty. On the surface the climate crisis doesn't seem too bad for us Brits but I do worry about the plants and how they are not doing the right things at the right times anymore.

My garden

I have got to October and I haven't put the heating on either. Besides the tennis this is another small blessing as my carbon footprint is slightly smaller because of the unusual weather. 

All week we have had news about the Conservative Party Conference. This has been the dark clouds on the horizon.  If they weren't in power their ideas would be laughable. For example, we now have a high speed train line being built that won't reach anywhere worthwhile. We have been told the Human Rights Charter needs to be torn up and we have found out that our government is taxing us more than at any time since WWll. To think we voted them in. It only goes to show that you can fool some of the people all of the time. 

Our half-pint, slithery, wimpy PM (Straits Times)

We also have had a number of knifing incidents in the news recently. These are teenage boys stabbing and killing fellow teenagers. The reports  tell how devastated the bereaved parents are and how this must stop, however, no one mentions what the parents of the perpetrators are feeling or doing. Surely the first step to stopping knife crime starts with parents stopping their children taking a knife out of the home. Am I being too simplistic?

Much closer to home, some youths torched a shed last week in the community orchard where I volunteer. This orchard is surrounded by homes where the owners are increasingly frustrated by the behaviour of kids who take drugs, make too much noise and vandalise the sanctuary. Even worse, the police here in Milton Keynes have little interest in stopping this antisocial behaviour. I am convinced these naughty boys are known to most people in the vicinity. I reckon the police should see picking off the miscreants as they are low hanging fruit - especially in the orchard!!!

So what is wrong with me? I am turning into a female Victor Meldrew. I cannot believe how little we do to make the world a better place. It makes my seethe. A few windfarms onshore would be far less of an eyesore than many nimbys suggest. Plus, we could all be more mindful of our carbon footprint - I sometimes get guilt pangs about this but I do try. 

I regularly cycle to the swimming pool to swim my lengths. I am getting obsessive about this by the way. This week I managed 450 lengths. I have my second 58 miles to swim before December. I am obsessed. Will I do it?

My little obsession

So my small obsessions and my fury at the world are in need of being sorted.. perhaps I should put these on my "to-do" list. But first a cup of coffee! 

Aiming High

 

Sophie and I

What a month this has been! For starters I have become a director of two potentially  international companies and I have had the good fortune to wander around some of the nicest real estate in the UK. These two things are not related by the way.

The logo

I as mentioned before, I visited Hampton Court earlier in the month with Ann and then last Wednesday I visited Blenheim Palace with Sophie. Oh, how the other half lived! In both places it was the gardens that most impressed me. Imagine being able to have a morning stroll around the garden in your dressing gown after your first coffee. To be honest, I wouldn't have enjoyed the impersonal life you would have led if you lived in one of these grand mansions but the gardens were particularly special. Indoors,  the amount of dusting, hoovering and cleaning really did need an army of workers. I definitely prefer something cosier and with less cleaning!

Blenheim Palace 

A rather nice vista- not a weed in sight

Something I do like the idea of is having pictures of ancestors on the walls. I reckon they would be quite a conversation starter when friends come round for a chat. You could share tales of how that one came to a sticky end or another had thirteen children so they built an extension to house them all. Old Winston Churchill was merely a cousin to the Duke of Marlborough but he earned his place at the heart of the family! Blenheim is the only palace in the UK not to be lived in by "royals". That is a good bit of trivia.

Behind the scenes I have found time to register two businesses with Companies House this month. Sarhan Group is Louai's baby. He has big plans now he is finalising his Ph.D. The other one is a partnership with Sammi. We are Boldface Editing. I am there to offer loads of advice  to both partnersnand do a bit of work now and again. I am excited how driven both Sammi and Louai are. Watch this space to find out more about "Boldface Editing" - Sammi's baby.

I had my grand daughter with me this Saturday. Ezra-Mae will be three in January. She is a whirlwind, non-stop talker. I have always about  planned four activities for each time she comes. I like to keep her busy and do purposeful things, This time after she had persistently and  hurriedly shooed Mum and Dad out of the door, we started our day with "blow" painting. This got off to a slow start. Firstly, Ezra-Mae didn't blow hard enough and then we had to work on direction. 

Once we had got over these two hurdles the pictures were pretty good. So, on to the second activity - replanting house plants that had outgrown their pots. Ezra-Mae loves mud! So this is what she did. She made mud and covered herself from head to toe, mostly. Then she wanted wanted more colouring so off we went for more "blow" painting. This is where my plans began to fail. I still had cooking to do and I knew she would be getting hungry. 

With a little "help" I managed to make chickpea fritters. They were frying by the time I realised they didn't have any chickpeas in them. Whoops!! A two-year old does things like that to you. God knows why I thought I could advise my new partners on their businesses. 

The trip to the park after lunch ended with me getting cross when a freshly muddied Ezra-Mae ran across a road - errr. I picked her up like a log and marched her home under my arm, showered her and we watched part of the Postman Pat movie which incidentally, I highly recommend. I suggest you just pretend to have a toddler with you while you watch.

So with thoughts of living a grander life while positioning myself as an international business woman, I reckon I have been brought back to Earth by a two-year old! She insisted she take the blow paints back to Mummy - Good luck with that, Danielle! My sanity would probably be the best I can hope for. That, and to keep smiling. That makes the world a happier place at least.