Another one bites the dust

Today we Keith decided that we needed to go over to Tywyn to visit Roberts the butcher. We have been there before because Keith is of the opinion that his pies are the best to be had. We even have the phone number of the shop on a sticker on the fridge. 
Well, we arrived in Tywyn, got out of the car, to be greeted by a deluge of Old Testament proportions. Knee deep in rain, we were, as we passed the local animal rescue fund-raising shop with its window display of a 1925 de-activated Colt pistol and a de-activated machine gun and I pondered briefly on the refreshing lack of attention to legal requirements of these quaint little Welsh towns.
Sadly, when we got to where we were going, we discovered that the butcher's shop has now morphed into a fishmonger's.

Keith was distraught and had to be helped immediately into the cafe next door to console himself with a coffee and slice of lemon meringue.
"We seem to have the kiss of death effect on businesses round here," he complained.
He could be right. The last time we went to Tywyn was for lunch at the Propergander, only to find that it too had closed.
Meanwhile, the weather was

well.... it was wet.

A winner!

For the past few years, Keith has done the lottery online and often won £10, which he disregarded as paltry, but which I thought was pretty good really and at least it was £10 better than nothing. However, as we both would have preferred a larger win, just a couple of million would do, I kept encouraging him, as in "You're obviously not doing it properly. Try harder!"

This morning, however, he informed me that we had won £156!

I have to inform you now that our lives will not change and we don't intend to spend it on a 5 bedroomed, detached house in a desirable area, plus a couple of top of the range cars, a yacht and private helicopter. No, we will continue to be ordinary, everyday people continuing to go about our normal, everyday lives.

To avoid disappointment, however, and because a refusal often offends, I would like to state that begging letters will be disregarded.

I know, it's tough, but there you are!

Decorating done

At the end of two frantic days, the kitchen and dining room are both now pristine in their new, clean decoratedness and I am prostrate in my exhaustion. Every bone in my body is protesting and I feel as though I need a week in bed to recover. Admittedly, I painted the ceilings this time and the walls of the dining room needed two coats, but I'm sure I don't recall being quite so tired after decorating these rooms last time.
Prior to this weekend, I had plans for moving on to the living room as my next 'project'. Visions of a new colour scheme and one wall papered in a dynamic up to date design filled my head. Now, however, as I look around said living room, I am persuaded that:

• the ceiling does not need painting at present
• nor do the walls
• I can live without a feature wall
• I can get by with just re-doing the glossing.

Of course, should we win the lottery in the near future, all decorating plans will be back on with a vengeance, the only difference being that I shall be paying someone else to do it!
Oh, and anyone who feels the need to make some remark about 'not being as young as you were' will be beheaded - instantly.

Tarmac but not here

How about this for a slightly idiosyncratic solution to the problem of a car being parked right where council workmen wanted to tarmac the road? To misquote the Everest windows advert, "Now I bet you didn't think they'd be doing that today, did you?"
As it happens, Keith was called out the following day to open a car parked behind the offending vehicle.
Fame at last!

B&Q Baby Boomer

Having paid a visit to a friend's new house the other day and seen, with envy and admiration, how much work she has done on it, decoration-wise, I have decided that the time has come to grab the bull by the horns and start decorating again. I have done it before. A few years ago, I decorated the living room, dining room and kitchen and later, the bathroom and conservatory. Being a newcomer to decorating - in my previous life, I was always relegated to stripping wallpaper and clearing up the mess - the results were by no means perfect, but by the time I was on to the conservatory, I think a degree of improvement was evident - if you squinted sideways through one eye at it, anyway.
So today, much to Keith's consternation, I called at B&Q and bought the requisites for doing the dining room and kitchen. I've got it sorted this time. Walls and ceilings will be white; that way it doesn't matter if I go over the edge with the paint. Simples!
I also remembered to register my 'over sixties' 10% off card and used it for the first time.
So now, I'm a member of the B&Q over-sixties club.
A B&Q Baby Boomer! Not sure how I feel about that...

Ten years

Ten years ago this summer, Mum was ill and getting weaker, the end result of an initial stroke at the age of 70 and a series of TIAs (transient ischaemic attacks or mini strokes) in recent years. I spent a lot of that year driving up and down the motorways most weekends between Liverpool, where I was then living, and Bristol  and then I stayed for nearly all of the school summer holiday to help out with her care. By then, she was almost bedridden and eventually was moved downstairs where she could be more 'in the loop' and it was easier to look after her.
So memories of that summer are a mixture -  hours doing record keeping and planning for the following term, as I usually did during the summer holidays, interspersed with caring for Mum, doing housework, cooking and shopping. I remember the weather being hot and humid and fans were essential.
The carers, when they began to come, were excellent; kind, caring women who did their job well and treated Mum as a person, rather than a patient. Some of them attended her funeral later in the year.
Kathy and Hugh had holidays which they took to spend time there too and Claire and James came when they could. Inevitably, those weeks were a time of difficult emotions and stress but there are good memories too;  Kathy and I decorating the bathroom, the care and sensitivity of Hugh when he lifted Mum in and out of bed, the sense that we were all pulling together and working as a team, and I look back at that summer as probably the last chance I had to spend any lengthy amount of time with Kathy and Hugh. Once your children are adults, they live their own lives, of course, but you value the time spent together all the more for that.
In a couple of weeks, Keith and I will be meeting up with Kathy and Claire to go and see Paul performing in his drama group - and that will be another moment for future memories.

And the weather this weekend...

When I saw the headline for this article in the Daily Telegraph, well, I got really excited. A weekend heatwave, hot enough to lead to health warnings! And then I read the article. As usual, anything that happens weather-wise  in the south east is immediately given prime coverage as if the whole of the UK is going to be affected. Yes, I know we are in the middle of Wimbledon and so the forecasts there are more than usually important, but this happens all year round. I pity the poor Scots. They routinely undergo hail, rain and chest-deep snow and no-one even hears about it.
At the moment, I am in Bristol (south west England). On Sunday, I shall be returning to North Wales, also on the west of Britain, so I shall not be affected by or interested in what the weather is doing over on the east, except to be mildly disappointed that I shall not need my factor 50 sun lotion whilst travelling, to protect me from the fiery rays of the sun.
Oh no, "Elsewhere in the country will be cooler, with unsettled conditions and temperatures in the low 20s in some places."  That's what we'll be getting.
On the other hand, it's probably just as well that I shall not be collapsing at the wheel with heat stroke like all those poor people in the 'Sahf East' innit!