You're never too old to.....................................

Never too old to learn.  There are many things I have learnt and the one that comes up again and again is "you're never too old to learn a bit of humility' I am pretty laid back compared to how I was pre MS & Stroke days.

However there is still one thing that really winds me up, that is queuing to put money in the bank (or taking it out for that matter.) I was in our local branch of Santander and at every resource there was a long queue, at the reception - queuing at enquiries - queuing and to see a teller , you got it queuing!!

Now we English  have always been the butt of jokes regarding queuing but I have never 'seen' the joke. Apparently if we see a line forming then we will join it therfore making a queue just for the sake of it.  I don't see that myself. I find it such a waste of time, and all time is precious, not to be wasted in a queue.

We had  parked close to the bank and as I did not want to get my carer to go to the trouble of lifting my scooter out, and I had my sticks with me we walked to the bank.

Standing is hard for me after a very short time and queuing takes it out of me. So not using my scoter  was my first mistake. Standing in the queue I overheard all the mumbles and grumbles from my fellow queue-rs. My second mistake was listening to them, that just exacerbated my own frustration. Just as I was nicely coming to the boil a member of staff was trying to get through the queue and I spotted her! Poor girl didn't know what hit her' "Where's the branch manager" I asked in a pretty stroppy manner. "He isn't available" the girl said, so sweetly, "can I help?" that was her mistake as she got both barrels of how there are always queues in her branch, there are only ever two tellers positions open when there are 5 available. That I have as have my fellow queue-res, who, by the way had by this point stopped grumbling and acted as though they had all the time in the world!, were sick and tired of always encountering queues at her branch.  The young lady, for she was thus, tried so hard to explain that there were other methods that were available for depositing cash or cheques which didn't require one to queue and of course the cash points were there to help as well. Huh, I'd got her there, I was banking money to my savings book so did need to see a teller! Again poor lass apologised and carried on through the banking hall. By the time I had been served I had noted most of the people in the queue were just paying in cheques to their accounts.

These were the people who could have used the 'other options' available to them. Then it slowly crept into my pea brain how unfair I had been to the bank employee. It really wasn't the banks fault, the queue was made up of people who need not have been there. I felt awful for the girl I had picked on and so on my next visit I went and found her and with a very red face and in hushed tones apologised! Humility, humble pie, some times they stand in front of you and will not go away until you accept a plateful and eat! So in future it will be mouth firmly closed if I am not aware of all the facts! Wonder if I can stick to it!

On a happier note Eddy and I spent a lovely day at Richards farm weeding overgrown raised beds, The sun was beaming down and it was a perfect day. Well it would have been if not for the nettles, they do sting so painfully and although we were surrounded by dock leaves, no matter how hard I rubbed the sore spot they did little to alleviate the stinging.  As you can see, one of the farm cats wanted to see what was going on - think he was thrilled we had sorted a nice spot for his personal use!  *note to self, get cat repellent for the veg garden!

Eddy had a good time expending pent up energy.  Digging and removing weeds is a great therapy and a healthy way to exercise. Well that's what I told him when he was beginning to flag.  Jack made the mistake of showing his face so he got roped in as well.  And a grand job he did! 

What did I do? well I sat between the beds and did a little light weeding and then made my way back to the farmhouse for refreshments. 
Notice the hair?  After persevering for almost 2 years I am know back to the old 'curly' me.  Joseph will be delighted as out of all the family he was the one to tell me that with straight hair I just didn't look like his Grammie anymore.

Dear Blog I must tell you that we had a terrific couple of emails from our friends Alice and Chris, who are working in Shanghai for the next couple of years.  Firstly it was terrific to hear of the birth of  their first grandchild, a little girl called Emily Grace (such pretty names) who was born to Chris's eldest son and daughter in law.  We have seen lots of pictures of her and she really is the cutest little doll!  I bet they are aching to hold her.  Which brought the 2nd great piece of news, they are coming home for a holiday in August!  I have missed them all so much it will be brilliant to see them all again, but doubly hard to say goodbye when the time comes.

As usual I have rambled on........................ so it's off to bed I go, Hi Ho, Hi Ho!!

Chasing the blues away.....................

Do you find there are times when for no apparent reason a murky grey cloud sits just inches above your head and before you know it you are feeling blue.

There is nothing really wrong it's just a feeling and a hard one to shift. I could never work out why it was described as 'feeling blue', after all blue should make you think of blue sky’s and sunny days; time to be happy and glad your alive. I think it would sound and explains the concept much clearer to say 'I'm feeling grey' - everyone would understand that. Any way I'm rambling again, so, to get back to my point. This totally uncalled for feeling, which is almost but not quite depression, has the ability to take the joy out of any day or even days.  So to distract myself  I began wondering just where we got the saying 'feeling blue' from.

My husband is an avid reader of the tall ships and the naval period of Nelson (Horatio, not Mandela or the guy from the Simpsons!) The writer Patrick O'Brien is one of his heroes. Think Master &; Commander and you will know the the type of story I mean.

Well, it seems that a lot of our sayings come from the Royal Navy and feeling blue is no exception. We are using a phrase coined from a custom among many old deep-water sailing ships. If the ship lost the captain or any of the officers during its voyage, she would fly blue flags and have a blue band painted along her entire hull when returning to home port. Indicating the sadness of the ship and crew.   Another one Eddy explained to me was Touch and Go - this relates to a ship's keel touching the bottom and getting right off again with no damage. Or how about Son of a Gun - I love this one.  Apparently ladies of easy virtue were often allowed to visit or even live aboard ship along with the crew when in port, and when the crew had been restricted to the ship for any extended period of time.  Frequently, but not uncommonly, children were born aboard, and a convenient place for this was between guns on the gun deck. If the child's father was unknown, they were entered in the ship's log as son of a gun.  Good eh?

Now I have no idea how this blog ended up rambling along till I helped educate you on Naval sayings.  It wasn't my intention.  I meant to record all about THE wedding and how my son Philip with Sarah and Joe got infected with Royal wedding fever and joined the crowds outside Buck house.  I also meant to introduce the rest of the four legged friends.  Never mind it will keep.  Here is a photo of Floyd III, our 'baby' of 11 months.  He hates to be left out of anything and I cannot have him sulking till my next update! So here's Floyd's waving goodbye pic!