Strangers On A Train

I have spent a rather pointless afternoon battling the vagaries of a banking call centre, which proved to be as lengthy as it was irritating..In between huffing and puffing at faceless jobsworths, I almost forgot that Albert needed his inoculation boosters, so after bundling him into the berlingo, I popped up to the vets.

As it turned out the vet was running late ( it is a rural surgery) so I had to wait, and as I sat there I struck up conversation with a woman who had been booked into the slot after  me. The woman had brought an over weight and rather cheerful Labrador to be seen, whose name, she informed me, was Winston.
Winston, she added had a bit of a nervous "tummy"
My companion, was a garrulous old soul. Within a few minutes, she had told me that she was a retired legal secretary, that she had recently been hospitalised for suspected gallstones and that her niece had recently obtained a doctorate in some high flying subject over in the States.
She didn't think much about the Christmas Television schedules, though quite enjoyed "Downton Abbey" and was fed up with the increasing number of fireworks that were set off by people on the "Estate" when the New Year was welcomed in.
Winston had been with her for three years  and she also had at cat at home called Frank or Franks....... and after those facts were shared I think I started to glaze over just a little.......
But she just kept on spouting.
The Stephen Lawrence case was discussed, her niece's slightly disastrous love life was touched upon and even the merits of cranberry juice for "bladder probs" was thrown into the mix.... and even though I sort of enjoyed our conversation, the sight of the vet hurrying into the surgery was a very welcomed sight

With Albert tucked under my arm, I said my goodbyes, and the woman beamed at me, holding up Winston's paw up in a jaunty wave!!

"oh I have enjoyed our chat" she said and with just a hint of sadness in her voice, she added candidly
"Do you know you are the first person I have spoken to properly since December the 18th"

I gave her a brave sort of smile ,and  suddenly felt like crying.... and I wondered who she chatted to over two weeks ago

Injured fingers,Storms and Sherlock

The second in command Cockerel, Badger and the marsh which is now the field

Now bare with me if my spelling and grammar is ,moderately worse than usual....

I can only type with my left hand and with the third finger on my right hand......a result of a particularly nasty fridge defrosting injury.....I won't bore you with the details...suffice to say that I am  having a little  trouble typing, picking my nose and wiping my bum!

Yes....enough said....

The storm which has buffeted the Uk today, hit home in Wales in the middle of the night. and  at 4am, me and my sore fingers were battling the elements on the field as part of the Churchyard fencing crashed down onto the goosehouse ripping part of the roof away.

In the dark and with Mabel watching every move, I fixed the roof and checked on each coop in turn.....we have been lucky .........despite up to 90 mile a hour gusts, nothing else has  been damaged severely (so far)...

Hens a lucky little souls, when it's dark. At night they literally go totally blind and will sit comfortably side my side, blissfully unaware that anything untoward is happening in the big bad world..

I didn't even get a murmur out of them when after opening one coop door, Mabel stuck her big fat head through to give a group a buffs a somewhat energetic once over!.

The torrential rain has saturated the field, to it's limit, too and most of the animals are living in rather damp unhealthy lives during the day.....its been a lousy winter so far,

Last night, with the wind screaming around the cottage we had an early night and watched the first episode of the  second BBC series SHERLOCK on iplayer.

Now for those that have not yet seen Benedict Cumberbatch's modern day portrayal of the famous detective, you are in for a real treat, as his Sherlock is a masterclass in charisma.

His  "more damaged" Sherlock is a borderline asberger sufferer....as being the genius we all know and love,he is sexually immature geek,  who is at times socially inept and rather isolated, a facet which makes his character even more compelling to watch.

He is clearly  my favourite incarnation of Holmes.....

...and I am not alone...... fellow blogger Kyna over at crystalcoastgardener 

seems to be a bit of a fan..it always amuses me when she refers to herself as a .........

If you are having a bad time at home, hiding away from this bloody awful weather........ go to iplayer and give the New Sherlock a go...... it's great fun

To everyone in the UK.... be careful and safe today.... that weather is a bitch! and not a cumberbitch!

A Better 2012

The Family Photograph Jan 1st 2012

Good Riddance To Bad Rubbish

It wouldn't surprise any one that 2011 has not been the best of years for us all..........in actual fact, tonight at the stroke of midnight I will endeavour to raise a large glass of a crisp white to the arse end of 2011 .......at the same time as I stick two fingers up at it.

My brother's illness and eventual death has had a profound effect on the family .......for most of the year in our own different ways we have tried to support him , his wife and each other as the inevitable deterioration of his body and mood took place as surely as spring turned into summer,and summer into Autumn.

It might sound strange but I kind of miss my weekly visits up in Denbigh. Without Andrew there to "look after" I now feel strangely redundant and "all at sea" when Thurdays come around....."Out of sorts" is another phrase that comes to mind as the nagging thought of "there's a job that needs to be done"  continually creeps into my consciousness.......of course it's nothing to what my sister in law will be experiencing.... but the feeling is there.... and it is an odd, unsettling emotion to deal with.

2011 has been dominated by the shadow of MND.

It is an unforgiving, destructive and terrible disease...............and I hate it with a passion.....As a result  , I am filled with a contempt that makes me want to turn my back on anything to do with the disease in the future..and I mean that.....
......I have had my total fill of it.
.....a fact that shows.............

Of course, I lost Constance this year too. And this little sharp pain of grief was unexpected as it was cruel.

Constance was a sick old dog. But she possessed a big heart and a rather moving and profound attachment to me, which not only pampered to my need "to be needed" but which also moved me greatly.

Watching her blossom from a shy sickly bag of nerves into a confident, kiss loving mass of flatulence, underlined just why keeping dogs can be such a pleasure....... a pleasure that sometimes is so brief and bittersweet on occasion, but one that is to me, as important as breathing.......I still miss her dreadfully

I also miss two friends that went their own ways in 2011 ...another two losses......it feels like a year of losses!

Of course there was good things to remember in 2011.

-Watching  the bloody awful "deal or no deal" with Andrew in the afternoons when he was more active, and watching him laugh at my feigned annoyance at not understanding the quiz rules

-Seeing my sister Janet take on the role of fund raiser extraordinaire, despite being convinced that she would be no good at it

-Being a part of the successes of the Village Flower Show and the annual Allotment open day

- saving no 21s leg with the help of Pat B, my amateur animal helper

It has not been enough though.....

Yes fuck off 2011..!........2012... you, are going to be a better year....I just know you are
and if you are not...... welll... then  you can fuck right off too!

Lou Charloff,

One of my favourite late night tv programmes is OLD JEWS TELLING JOKES
I love it!
makes me feel ok with getting older!!!!!!!

Pretty Bollocks

 

When I was growing up in the seventies, it was the Roger Moore Bond movies that thrilled and entertained us. Fast paced,and  with a plot line that would not tax the average twelve year old....they were full of exciting set pieces, exotic locations, busty sex objects and gadgets galore.....so it was much amusement and nostalgia that I enjoyed the 2011 reincarnation of say Live and Let Die in the modern day guise of Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol.

OK everything in MI4 is bigger, better and more polished than any Bond that I remember but the essential premise is exactly the same....

It's all flash, bang, wallop!

The Lovely Mr Renner

......The set pieces ( a tense standoff in the tallest skyscraper in the world -the Burj Khalifa in Dubai during a sandstorm and the bombing of the Kremlin) being just two of several standout sequences, where the bland Eithan Hunt (Tom Cruise) struts his box office pleasing invincible stuff.

This time Hunt's team is pared down to just three. A busty platonic Amazon (Paula Patton), a friendly geek (Simon Pegg) and all American Jock-with-a-past (Jeremy Renner)  (right) and

Of course they have only a few hours to save the world, which they do ingeniously and with some style and excitement.......

It's all bollocks...certainly it is... but it is entertaining, enjoyable and satisfying bollocks.......

8/10

Pretty but Dull- Lady Mary and the floppy haired Mathew Crawley

.......and talking of enjoyable bollocks.....This morning I actually made the effort  and watched the

Downton Abbey  Christmas "Special" Now....despite my scathing  criticism of the lacklustre second series... this two hour Edwardian romp finally showed it's dramatic backbone  which echoed writer Julian Fellow's cinematic period piece....the glorious Gosford Park, and provided an enjoyable Yultide story!

At last we saw dull Lady Mary ( who should have "had a canary Up the leg of her draws!") getting all romantic with the beautiful Mathew while Maggie Smith chewed the scenery like a good'un

Like Mission Impossible 4, Downton is generally good looking frothy bollocks........it's pretty to look at and it's easy on the brain......

just what you need on a wintry, cold and blustery day!

10 Things You Don't know About Me

It's been a lazy kind of day.

Couldn't think of anything interesting to write about........ I considered discussing the merits of the infeasably large photo of Kim Jong Il being paraded on his funeral parade......

but seeing that I was kind of impressed with the logistics of it all....I won't waste time slagging it off.....

So, in lieu of a slag of... I set myself a sort of quiz....... could I actually come up with a list of facts that no one else knows about......some of which may be of use to anyone writing my biography...( when I eventually become famous!)...

OK here goes...

1. The first guy I had a relationship with, was a cheerful scouse medic called Roger...... he lived in Manchester and I lived in Sheffield, so we basically saw each other at weekends, high days and holidays......

After 9 months a friend of his, who decided that she liked me more than him, rang me up one day to inform me that he had a fiance ( A WOMAN!) ,(who he lived with) ...suffice to say I didn't get an invite to the evening do!

2. In 1984 I did a parachute jump for charity even though I cannot abide heights.

Luckily I was connected to a static line, which thankfully opened my chute automatically as I totally forgot any of my pre jump training...........

I wore one of my Brother's old all in one silver rally suits ( I was showing off ) which totally got covered in shit when I crash landed into a ploughed field, subsequently broke my collar bone  and got dragged around it for an age when the wind caught in my canvas!

3. I was once voted "best arse" in the Prestatyn High School 6th form awards ( no jokes please!)

4. I never owned a dog until I was 40

5. I was once attacked by an 80 year old hebephrenic schizophrenic when I was kneeling on the floor putting on her slippers..........she blacked both my eyes!

6. As a child I nearly died twice...... I once choked on a mint imperial when I was around 8,  and was saved by my quick thinking mother who upended me over a sink in my father's shop to dislodge the offending sweet .

    I also very nearly drowned in a hotel swimming pool in Loret del Mar (Spain).....I went under for the third time.....silently ( I didn;t want to make a fuss) and was only saved when a man noticing my hand poking up through the water, lifted me onto the side of the pool.....

I have never liked water since! (and to be honest I have never been too keen on mint imperials either!)

7. I suffer from sleep apnoea.....once, at the Guttman's Paralympic village  when I was sharing a dormitory with a score a paraplegics...... the lads got so sick of my snoring so much so, that in the middle of the night they got up in their wheelchairs and pushed my bed through the emergency exit!

8. I am colour blind........(take a look at my fashion sense if you find that a difficult one to believe)

9. Walking down 2nd Avenue in New York on one rainy Monday morning, I once literally bumped into Sigourney Weaver

10. I have never been arrested but I was once cautioned by two York policemen when I was caught peeing in the street dressed as a gorilla

Normality

Fine Weather!

No rain!

No wind....

Bugger me...I can't quite believe it.!!!!!

The village seemed awash with walkers sweating under their woolly hats this morning... and even  octogenarian Olwenna Hughes, who is extremely shaky on her old pins was out strolling in the sun.

It tickled me that even though she had been effectively marooned inside her bungalow for weeks because of the bad weather, she still knew exactly what had been happening in the village...

"It was nice that you went to Church on Christmas Eve " she called out in her sing song way.."

I reminded her that I only went for the carols!

For the first time in weeks, I had the opportunity to check over the animals on what has turned out to be an unseasonably warm day. The Crackhead Whores with their Alpha female, Vinegar tits, now smart in their newly grown feathers, have blossomed under  some intensive "feeding up". Settled in to their part of the field, they have relaxed somewhat and have stopped their bully-girl activities with the older hens....

I will reluctantly admit that I really should change their collective name seeing that they have all undergone a sort of "pretty woman-like" transformation over the past two months.......but I shall resist the urge......I really think I should be true to their drug taking and loose knickered past!

The Crackhead whores all looking rather splendid (Vinegar tits is on the right)

And so, all afternoon, I have cleaned away the rain soaked damage inflicted in November and early December...and it has been therapeutic as it was necessary....I have just been seeing to the basics for a while now......

Boris....happy at surviving another Christmas

,

One of the Crackheads blooming

The Indian runners still, fit and healthy and hysterical  around their pond

As I dredged the pond at the back of the field, I noticed an old couple in the graveyard. They were leaning against the fence, watching the geese "arguing" with the indian runners over a bowl of corn and called me over in order to buy some eggs.

The graveyard is always busy at Christmas with people dropping off wreaths and flowers .....and I always try to be respectful of people's  feelings, especially if they look like they need some quiet and reflective time by the graves of their loved ones. (The geese in particular, can be bloody invasive with their honking!)

Hummm...respectful eh? Look what T shirt I had chosen to put on today

whoops

Even Mabel was not impressed

Boxing Day Big Up!!

As I walked around a gale lashed Trelawnyd this morning, the rather dishevelled woman in a towelling dressing gown who I spied washing up the dishes, summed up all of the festive stressors of the past few days as she puffed out her cheeks with that "I 'm soddin' well knackered" kind of look.

I tried to send her my best "I've paddled that canoe" sort of look right back....but she was already fishing around her cleavage for a dropped piece of hot ash from her cigarette so couldn't see me!..

Boxing day...... it's all the same.

Yesterday was a game in two halves really..... a restful day together with the dogs

(yes below if my "official" New Christmas hat photo)

and then a complete bunfight of cooking when the family came around for dinner.

It all went well..... the food was ok........Chris won the Downton Abbey general knowledge Quiz and after too many small sherries we all raised a glass to Andrew in a coordinated iphone toast with my sister in law,

And so it's over....

Boxing day is here with it's obligatory long walk....crap tv and cold meat. 

I managed to sneak a few cold roast potatoes out for the pigs this morning who sucked them up with exquisite piggy pleasure....but there was little else to share with the hens, who have all disappeared into the hedgerows due to the bad winds.

To keep out the cold... I have treated them to a huge bowl of festive spaghetti......they are easily pleased....

Chris has just gone to B&Q to buy some picture pins to hang up his pressie from me...which is a small French miniature of a "lady"......he liked it...and it is rather sweet, even if I do say so myself.......

Perhaps Tom....you could tell us something about it?......It's all French to me!

The Red faced Welsh farmer has just driven past the cottage.....he sounds as though he's doing a Long John Silver impersonation.......the wind is getting up and the thought of braving the elements to fight over a cheap tv at comet seems vaguely disgusting.........

So that's our Boxing day......I will leave you all with my best wishes......and a BIG up for fellow blogger ELIZABETH STANFORTH-SHARPE( see her blog entry:-

a-dip-in-the-ocean

http://www.justgiving.com/Elizabeth-Stanforth-Sharpe1

After reading about my sister's Herculaneum efforts to raise money for Motor Neurone Research and of the sad death of Andrew only a few weeks ago, Bette ( and I hope you don't mind me calling you Bette!) has got off her arse so to speak and has organised herself into a one woman, money raising swimming champion...... and all in aid of MND......

My family have been moved, so very much by her sincere and generous offer of help ( she must be mad as a box of frogs too as she is braving Scarborough's Icy waters in the height of winter) so I wanted to "big up" her plan here...so that if any of you would like to sponsor the plucky old gal......please follow the links and do so..................she and indeed  WE would be VERY grateful if you did.....

Bette Stanforth Sharpe in slightly earlier days

Christmas Eve

Finlay, our first Welsh terrier loved Christmas

Like I said Yesterday....Have a lovely Christmas x

Merry Christmas fa---la----la-la-la..lalalala

Well I have  woken up from a fireside slumber ( complete with Welsh Terrier attached to my face) and have just realised that my last post was far too depressive

So I will leave you with my much lauded festive Christmas photograph (taken last year) and some heartfelt good wishes to everyone who actually reads  this ....my "diary of a middle aged nobody" pile of shit

Let us all have a peaceful Christmas eh? 

Please take my advice!!!!!!!!!!!!
Catch up with family, with friends or just your significant other

Sit through 2 hours of Downton Abbey with a whole chocolate Orange in your mouth

and whatever you do DON'T  watch the news

xxxxxxxxxxx

pps

watch this from 23 seconds onwards..... I dare you not to give me a little Christmas smile

xxxx

Blackout

Last night we were sat in Sainsburys cafe and just about to tuck into a rather tasty fish and chip supper, when all the lights went out!
The whole retail park and adjoining streets were totally in darkness, and after a moment of uncertainty  (when I couldn't quite locate my last chip) the supermarket's  dim emergency lighting kicked in and suddenly a few hundred shoppers all acted as though they had survived a terrorist attack.....
The powercut continued, but we were allowed to shop in the gloom as the tills re booted.....and as we did our shop in the muted hysteria people indulge in  when faced with a collective "threat", I had a seriously worrying "think" about just how we, as a nation would cope without the all singing , all giving God Electricity......
Not very well...I suspect.......
People today have no reserves when it comes to disaster have they? . People just don't have proper larders anymore, they have no stockpiles of food,fuel, water and other vital items. We rely on these monolithic supermarkets for food that would empty within hours if not refilled by fuel guzzling lorries and we rely on electricity  for almost everything else......electricity  that can disappear literally at the "flick of a switch"

Yes I thought about all this as we filled our basket with tasty stuffing and Christmas baubles..........
and before we left.... I made sure several packets of store cupboard candles were placed into the trolley.

....as I wait......

I am sat at the kitchen table waiting for a delivery man to drop off some vital computer equipment for Chris....of course no time can be specified, given the Christmas deadlines....so I have to be around, and available all day....

There is an upside to all this....for as  I  wait here...I have been making lists for the "Christmas dinner" shop we are embarking on this evening......In between the planning of the sherry trifle and the reviewing of a recipe for Braised Red Cabbage ( thanks Pat), I have had time to notice

those grubby little marks around the kitchen that have always been previous neglected.....namely the dog snot on the back door ,the dribbles of kittikat down the side of the fridge and that lump of something unmentionable under the sofa.....

Not being content just to look at these little badges of pet ownership, I have got off my arse and scrubbed the offending areas clean.......so much so....that the kitchen is actually starting to look......er.....well....... habitable......

A first for me, I can tell you.

 

Most of the dogs have stalked off for a sleep, all that is except Mabel who feigning slumbers is now keeping one eye open to see what  I would start scrubbing next......she closed both eyes firmly when I found myself muttering in true Joan Crawford style 

"Its not you I'm mad at...I'm mad at the dirt"

Being a typical bulldog, she cannot cope with any bad feeling!

Anyway, it's 1.10pm and still there is no sign of Mr Delivery Man.....all visible signs of dog snot have now been removed from the kitchen and I have completed at least three " to do" lists on the back of three envelopes.........I am confident that most Christmas day boxes have now been ticked...

My two sisters and their husbands are all coming for Christmas dinner here.....Non of us really feel like celebrating but the effort has to be made to mark the day .....tomorrow I am going down to B& Q to buy some cheap as chips Christmas lights....with the aim of transforming something like this

into something like THIS

This being......Nigella's twinkling Kitchen....

Hopefully the effect with raise a few , well needed smiles!!!!!!

Hello?

Message Left on the Answerphone this afternoon

This is a transcription in it's entirety

"I have a little something ready for you!" rasped the breathless voice.......".I will be in alllllllll day!...pop round if you're free!!!!"

That was it!

A secret admirer...organising a bit of rural extramarital rumpy pumpy perhaps?

Naw....... Auntie Glad has just baked me a load of mince pies!

Sherlock Holmes- A Game Of Shadows

A tough, sexy Watson and a vulnerable Holmes

Now first let me say that I am a huge fan of Sherlock Holmes.....Basil Rathbone....Benedick Cumberbatch.....Jeremy Brett........I have enjoyed every one of the sleuth's reincarnations both on the big screen and on tv....and even though Guy Richie's first foray into the genre (The slightly zany

Sherlock Holmes 2009) was somewhat superhero-ish, I must admit, it was a most enjoyable romp of a movie.

Richie's sequel is very much more of the same.........overly stylised , and cinematically complicated...the movie uses GCI and slow motion visual tricks to highlight Holmes' lightning intellect....so much so, that the audience is whisked away from the "normality" of Baker Street and Victorian London literally within seconds of the opening credits being rolled......

This film is a totally different take on the Conan Doyle's hero...

Robert Downey Jr. makes for a charismatic and rather dangerous Holmes...He is not the asburger loner portrayed by Benedict Cumberbatch (my personal favourite Holmes) nor is he a calculating Jeremy Brett, posh toff......he is, in fact, a drug addled,brittle, hyperactive child genius...who relies more on his cool as a cucumber best friend Dr Watson (Jude Law) than ever he did in the original novels

Both actors make the characters their own.... Downey is likable and just vulnerable enough to be always sympathetic....and Law oozes a smart sexiness and toughness which keeps him on level pegging status with Downey on screen.....

Their partnership works beautifully.....

Having said all this, both lead performances are almost eclipsed by Jarred Harris's menacing performance as Professor Moriarty....he makes for a cracking baddie........a necessary foil for Holme's seemingly invincible hero..

Stephen Fry does a nice comic turn as Sherlock's brother Mycroft and Noomi Replace ( the original Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) even turns up as a Gypsy fortune teller...... it's all very silly, it's all very showy.... and it's all great fun.....

A new Sherlock Holmes franchise continues

Stephen Fry as Mycroft

War Horse

We went to see the new Sherlock Holmes film this evening....and a cracking romp it was too!
I shall give a review of it tomorrow...but I will leave you with this trailer for the forthcoming Spielberg weep fest WAR HORSE, which proceeded the main feature this evening.
I can honestly say that this is the only trailer that has actually brought me to tears (I lasted until the 53rd second when the look on that horse's face literally finished me off)......Bugger alone knows what will happen when I eventually see the film.........
Watch and weep....... Spielberg is a master

"Oh, I wish I was Good With me hands"

Oh I wish I was good with me hands......
(No it's not the start of a Pam Ayres poem by the way)

I  really envy people which have such talents...

Today Jackie our ever-cheerful dog groomer Transformed this

Into THIS!

and did so effortlessly and with some considerable skill!

As she worked, I pottered around the cottage like some reject presenter from Blue Peter

I made a simple Christmas wreath for the doorway

and spent a somewhat irritating hour or so making paper chains for the living room .......
(Occupational therapy for the mentally bewildered!)

The red faced farmer made me laugh when I told him what I had been doing.....

"Not a job for a man!" he bellowed cheerfully as he drove off down the lane!!!!!

so Ronery?

I am having a moment to dry myself off.......

I don't know exactly where is wetter..... INside the cottage or OUTside in the rain?

All I do know, it that I needed to employ the "spirit that won the war" kind of mentality and stop bellyaching and start cleaning and drying.

Apart from the now post industrial looking concrete floor, the kitchen now looks almost human again. A neighbour Arfon, hearing about our misfortune brought around a dehumidifier this morning, and with the help of a few mobile heaters, the place is habitable once again.

Pat B, my unofficial animal helper called around too, with a festive cake (complete with bow) and Carys, who is one of my egg customers also battled the rain to deliver a small Christmas gift.... it is these little tokens of kindness that really lifts the spirits..........Even Mrs "Pen-y-cefn" Jones, who is well into her eighties and who always insists on referring to me as "Mr Gray" sent a generous donation for the Motor Neurone Disease association after she heard about my brother.......

Anyhow I need to go and get changed......I may even make an effort and go and have a bath.....

I need to make sure that I make more of an effort with my personal grooming....

Especially given the fact that the only person I know with worse dress sense and a more unforgiving haircut died today!

Kim Jong il

John looking ill

"Ho Ho, Bleeding Ho"

I was reminded of this old joke today

"Well, it was during the famous Johnstown flood. The dam broke and when the water hit our house it knocked it right off the foundation. Grandma got on the dining room table and floated out safely."
"How about you?"
"Me? I accompanied her on the piano!"

 

Boom Boom!

I flooded the kitchen today.

It was a case of too much on my mind and lots of jobs to do.

I started to wash up the dishes. Collected the dogs and put them into the car. Made sure I had found some Christmas Cards to deliver and went off blissfully unaware I had left the kitchen sink tap running full pelt.

I returned home an hour later, to find an apoplectic Chris standing in two inches of water amid the wreckage of the kitchen...he was late for Church and was surrounded by a collection of sodden towels and the strangely odd spectacle of the lino floating gently on top of a small lake...like a low . flat water bed.

I had promised to go with Chris to the Church Christmas Lunch, after the morning service, so had to  work like a Trojan  to rip up the lino and remove 26 loads of water with the carpet cleaner!.Luckily the water had only infiltrated 2 to 3 inches into the lounge (originally Chris had bellowed that the flood had covered half of the living room!!!)..so apart from the kitchen looking remarkably like the floor of the pig hut.....we were fairly lucky.......

Oh I could have done without all this today.

As it turned out, the Christmas lunch at the village pub was rather a jolly affair...A couple of large Pinot's, a nice meal and the rector and organist being  on "good form" helped a great deal...... and for the first time since my brother died, I actually found myself  enjoying our one and only Christmas "do".

Having said that........the kitchen still looked like a cess pit when we returned home

The Ghost Of Christmas Past

I think I have only ever had one naff Christmas

It was in 1990 when I was a student nurse working on an acute medical ward.

I completed the early shift on Christmas day with a miserable hangover ( and with a menopausal Dutch staff nurse in charge).......then went home, fed my cats...piled up all of the family gifts into my car and set off from Sheffield to drive the two hours back to wales.....full of Happy Christmas feelings and good will to most men!

Only my car wouldn't start!

It was cold

It was miserable

It was dark

I was alone...

and to cap it all..... I had no food in the house

Christmas dinner, as it turned out, was two individual pork pies and a mars bar bought from the 24 hour garage

and when I turned on my battered old portable tv (in my luxurious student pad living room complete with deckchair seating)........fuck all happened.........

I remember crying  in my deckchair , whilst drinking the dregs from a bottle of gin and listening to radio 4

Thank goodness things before and after 1990 have been generally more festive, even though I have often worked!!

So come on everyone.... give me your best (WORST) Christmas Stories...........

Share it with the group!