Busy

 Mr Pudding Sent me this update on the book today which I will accept with a wry smile. There may only be one or two here that will understand just how odd this picture feels for me lol

Busy day today 

Lectures and group work all day. 

Discussion group on gender issues on line until 6.30 than I’m off to work to cover sickness. Don’t worry dearheartx I’m not over doing it, will take Thursday off work in Lieu 

AI isn’t all what it’s made out to be

 Well, I spent the morning in the library writing my defence mechanism essay

Then spent a lot of the afternoon playing with AI on line which has made me look unreadably sexy or a dead ringer for Benjamin Disraeli .

The styles have been hilarious , occasionally flattering and just odd

Here are a few

Ai ‘S spelling is dreadful 

A chapter

*

 The bulldog sitter Mike texted me around 6.30am stating everyone had had a wee this morning and all had gone back to bed. Dorothy had been given her painkillers hidden in a piece of boiled chicken and had slept by his side on the couch all night.

They had watched an entire box set of something I’ve not heard of and he had eaten three quarters of the quiche I had prepared yesterday in addition to the beers I had bought in special 

I was somewhat embarrassed when he told me he’d done a load of washing after spying a small pile of underwear, uniforms and T shirts in the laundry basket by the washing machine 

That’s a friend for you.

But I’ve had a busy long night and need sleep so I didn’t dwell on things.

* Yorkshire Puddings version of Going Gently the novel lol

Ps the ponies are back

 

This childhood prayer came to my mind today

“ God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”

This isn’t about Dorothy 

Believe me I’m much too pragmatic to be catastrophizing about a much loved pet. Dorothy is unwell but miles better today than she was. She is pain free, eating gently, hydrated and remains comfortable. But she IS around eight years old ( the vet was shocked as she looks like a bulldog half that age) and will have inherited the genes of dogs not built for old age. She has clearly lost weight, a possible sign of some further malignancy, but I and she will carry on as long as her quality of life remains good for her.

Thank you all for your kind wishes.

I was working yesterday and could not have sorted what I did, if it wasn’t for the support of manager and colleagues who made everything a whole lot easier. A thank you to them.

I’m sat at the newly cleaned kitchen table, Dorothy remains clingy, so she has slept with Mary on the kitchen reading chair. I have cleaned the who kitchen so she knows I’d never leave her and the kitchen.

I turned on talk radio , but turned off the news discussions. 

I have realised that I don’t watch the news anymore. I don’t tend to read blogs that cover the conflict in Gaza either, I find the feeling of impotency, after reading them, fruitless,  and the anger generated by them of little use. Some people need to have that anger stoked and I get the power of sharing it, especially as the answer to many is a plain yet fruitless stop it! But anger attracts anger and what good does it eventually do in the long term.

My niece-in-law lost her mom today and needed a kind word. 

I’m working tonight and a friend has offered to bulldog sit for me.

I’ve made him a thank you quiche

Sick

 

Dorothy is not well

The vet thought pancreatitis 

I agreed she has the symptoms, though not the temperature  

Meds, pain relief but not yet needing IV fluids

She will be reviewed again tomorrow morning.

She’s clingy and needy and sad 

And almost collapsed once when trying to vomit

I’ve seen patients do that so didn’t panic 

I don’t panic when the animals are poorly

She’s wrapped in one of my jumpers with her head on my side

They break your heart just a little, don’t they?

Spanish Interlude

The lisping gets me everytime

I’d love a Spanish boyfriend

I’m at the hospital 

A faceless outpatients

Running late

Thank goodness for wifi

Dorothy is unwell today

 

Gwahoddiad

Old Trevor’s funeral was held at Prestatyn Church. I know the Church well, mostly negative memories of family funerals for my grandparents , parents  and brother all had their final services there.

The church was cold and I was thankful for my new woollen coat.

I spied Animal Helper Pat and walked in with her, there was a good turn out given Trevor’s age

The young vicar Gregor performed the service after testing the microphones in the pulpits with a brusque 

testing ! Testing ! 

My mother would have frowned at that.

And in the half silence before service I remembered my grandmother being supported up the aisle by my mother and Uncle Jim at my grandad’s funeral

She was wailing “ My boy, ,my poor boy!” 

That was a bad funeral

Trevor’s was an uplifting one. 

A long eulogy read by Canon John Evans centred upon a life well enjoyed and lived but it was kind of sad to see the tiny coffin, just a little bigger than a child’s being wheeled past covered in lilies. 

The congregation sang Abide with me well and the Welsh hymn Gwahoddiad passably but it is really a hymn that needs a totally Welsh speaking congregation to do it proud, having said that I could hear Animal Helper Pat’s sweet soprano mingling in with my sudden bass . And a few Welsh voices at the back lifted the harmony enough for it to be moving.

I didn’t stay around the Church door after the service as so many do.

I find all that really embarrassing.

I walked around the Church and looked briefly at my parent’s Gravestone which lay unattended and cold looking, before heading off for home. 

My new coat keeping me warm was a comfort on a bittersweet day.

The Rose -Trelawnyd male Voice Choir

When Spring IS Mrs Doubtfire!

Yesterday I parked at the beach with a coffee and just closed my eyes to the sun 

Gawd I felt so much better.

For the first time since Lockdown, I reckon that this winter has been the worst in my history

It’s been dreadfully depressing

Physically depressing .

It’s almost caught me out

But hasn’t ! 

Yesterday’s sun was my MRS DOUBTFIRE moment 

The snowdrops by the garden arch

The daffodil buds by the garden gate

Tracy Manchester’s kind text about the Memorial Hall windows

Help is on the way dears! 

Spring is on the way 

Funeral Etiquette

 

Even working Friday night, it seemed a long weekend, all told.

I don’t do well without at least some company over a 48 hours, even if it’s a phone call or a brief chat,

C’est la vie !

It’s Trefor’s funeral on Wednesday and I’ve nothing to wear

The etiquette for funerals generally is pretty fluid nowadays but even I recognise the fact that I cannot go to the Welsh funeral in a custard yellow sou’westers jacket even if it’s Northface made

I’ve been needing a proper, coat for years.

So this morning I bought one from Marks And Spencer 

What an indulgence ! 

It’s lovely.

Grey, wool and simple .

I tried it on with my own green cashmere scarf ( which Chic Eleanor even noticed) and looked very New York. Even with my crocs on.

The camp, tubby salesman rather enjoyed it when I said I felt very New York and joined in telling me if I had a floppy hat on I’d look very Helen Bonham Carter! ( he was referring to my crocs) 

Cheeky cunt!

Don’t worry your sweet little heads about my crocs dear readers,  they will not be worn on Wednesday.

On a roll I also treated myself to some budding daffodils and a new fruit bowl from Habitat in Sainsbury’s which was reduced in their sale to 5£  

I bought a MacDonalds coffee and sat at the beach with my face to the sun.

It was glorious and felt like such an indulgence.

It’s half term this week, but I need to catch up with my Uni homework so have booked a room in the library for all day tomorrow 

Hey ho

Bloody Roger

 

It’s been a bit of a bust of a day.

I had nothing planned, and there were no good films I hadn’t seen yet at the cinema, so after a walk and breakfast, and a perfunctory chat about dog dirt along Bryon Street with Mrs Trellis, I lay back down on the bed to read.

I woke around 2 and could smell burning. 

I suspected that village Elder Islwyn was up to tricks, but the smell wasn’t damp woodsmoke but smouldering banana and orange.

Roger! 

After mopping the kitchen floor I had left Roger’s crate against the washing machine .

In his gleeful few hours of being unsupervised he had climbed onto the crate, then onto the kitchen worktops where he ate three eggs from the fishy designed bowl, several reachable sugar lumps from a container which I thought would have had a lid a Dim Welsh terrier could not have opened.

More importantly he had turned on the halogen oven hob with his warm paw. Luckily it was a back burner, the one I seldom use, but a much loved fruit bowl lay to one side and in his adventures Roger had slid it back over the hob.

I was lucky the cottage didn’t go up in flames

Now before the collective gnashing of teeth starts

We’ve all had one of these moments of luck in our lives.

More graphically I remember silently drowning in a swimming pool in Lloret Del Mar when I was ten, before some nameless man reached down to laugh me out. 

No man , no Going Gently, no little life lived

It’s a real It’s a wonderful life kind of moment if you let your head run away with things.

A Letter In The Post

 There is always something to be grateful for.

Last night as I was driving to work, I listened to an old friend’s personal podcast

A verbal letter to me from sunny Australia

A personal hello, to me in the Bluebell confessional 

In the dark and rain

A friendly voice in a dismal winter.

I have known Nia since her childhood. 

When we were both gauche, and products of our own little town.

We haven’t grown apart in forty years for our affection for each other remains.

We just don’t talk regularly.

So now Nia will send me a podcast message.

A chatty Kathy round Robin to match what she catches up on Going Gently.

Her family news in Australia, her thoughts and feelings and worries and triumphs 

Wrapped up in a verbal letter,

Like the ones we used to send

A million years ago.

Gemini

 I’m late with my nephew’s London visit gift. I’m pushing him to try for a revival of A Chorus Line at Saddler’s Wells, but we shall see. I also want to go to Buckingham Palace which opens July to September. That’s one for my sister Janet too, a birthday gift to both of us.

Some guys from work have invited me to see Cosi Fan Tutte by The Welsh National Opera in March

I’m going

Do you believe in star signs ? 

I never did.

But I do now as I enter my dotage.

I’m a typical Gemini 

I am Quick witted, and I miss nothing.

That’s a curse too sometimes

For I can tell you word for word of a conversation made and long forgotten by many, especially if I was hurt by it. 

My grandmother used to read tea leaves but I knew she could read people 

Some people can

Most cannot.

I am drawn by confidence, and warmth and brightness.

And manliness but not testosterone 

We are back to the hole in the jumper thing.

It’s the middle of the night and I’m having a stream of thoughts as I sit and read and type. 

It’s quiet tonight and we are babysitting rather that treating and medicating and comforting .

Everyone is having normal sleep.

And that’s how it should be

Sleep ..yes and I’m Including one of the magnificent Orme Billy goats here, who has sheltered from the blustery night, by sitting under the canopy of our reception .

Bits

 

Weaver, get your carers to bring you in a McDonald’s kitikat McFlurry, when they get a chance, bloody lovely.

I had one tonight on the way to work with a coffee and sat on the dark Promenade in Colwyn Bay listening to the sea as I ate it.

I’m on two nights and we’ve had no snow, even though it had been forecast. The hospice was grateful as covering me would have been difficult if I’d been snowed in. The parents of the local school children were pissed off as the school alongside 77 other ones in Flintshire had been closed as a precaution.

I’ve received four phone messages, one phone call, one audio message and a valentine’s card today.

The audio message was feedback for my skills practice from my tutor which was nice as it was positive. My first few have been a work in progress, shaving away all the bad habits I’ve employed over the years.

I can be “ too challenging” at times…..something which is common in Gemini men.

I’m working on it.

The Valentine card was from a blog reader and it was kind.

One message was from a beautiful Greek girl who used to work in the hospice. She now lives in Manchester and is as beautiful on the inside as she is on the outside. She misses me. I used to make her laugh. I miss her too.

Funny I watched the Guns Of Navarone this afternoon. 

Didn’t Irene Papas have big eyebrows?

Just a thought

Manon

 Kenneth McMillian’s tale of unpleasant people acting unpleasantly in 18th Century Paris  comes into its own when the poet Des Grieux ( Reece Clarke ) dances with the dying love of his life Manon (Natalia Osipova) in the New Orlean Swamps.

I was wrung out by the end of it all. But I must say one other small scene made me more emotional , and that was when the Corps de Ballet , their hair shorn, their dresses in rags entered as one as they played the prisoners sent to New Orleans by ship. When they danced, with arms around each other, I felt overwhelmingly sad and incredibly moved.

A powerful and amazing bit of theatre by The Royal Opera House 

Calon Lân

 It’s old Trefor’s funeral next Wednesday . With the church now shut he’s had to wait for a slot in nearby Prestatyn, where his sister’s lived. I wonder if Calon Lán will be sung at his funeral? The hymn is often the first choice at funerals is as it means a “Pure Heart” in Welsh.

The above version has been set to different music, but remains powerful in its own right, a credit to the two young Welsh women singing it.

Thank You

Mary

Thank you Will who called today to check on a missing roof slate when he didn’t have to and to promising to sort it by the end of the week.

Thank you to Donna from Uni who checked up on me when the tutor told the class I was off sick.

Thank you to Trendy Carol’s Hubby, who looked after the dogs when he didn’t have to today.

Thank you to sister Janet who asked me to see Manon at the cinema tomorrow 

Thank you to Trendy Carol who kept Mary a few hours longer as she was asleep , like only older dogs sleep when they find a comfy corner.

Thank you for your blog comments and

Thank you whoever invented macaroni cheese 

Bloody lovely for a late tea after sleeping all day