Rather a lot going on at the moment, which explains my lack of posting. Dot took quite a while to recover from her cold after Buxton, and she still has a bit of a cough, as have I. Feel more or less all right, though, especially as I’ve just booked a fortnight in Ballater at a house called The Coyles in Golf Road, just round the corner from the legendary wee house.
Today is a lovely winter’s day, with blue sky and not really cold after an initial frost. I walked up to the Rosary for about half an hour, under doctor’s orders. He took my blood pressure last Wednesday and pronounced it too high. I declined his offer of more pills, and he gave me a month to show some progress. Have booked an appointment online for March 15. It was the only one available.
Took Phil to the doctor’s last Thursday, and after returning him home and calling on the vicar with cheques, took the car in for servicing, which came out at an unexpectedly high £400. Walked home (of course), but Dot drove me up to fetch it at tea time.
The service included cleaning the car, which was fortuitous, as the following day was Peter Beales’ funeral, which was big enough to make it on to TV as well as into the newspapers. Dot and I drove to the nursery and took advantage of the coach into town to avoid problems with parking. Fortunately seats were reserved at the front of the church for us (as family), and I managed to keep three chairs plus a wheelchair space for Angela, Rodney, Vicki and A Ethel. The latter survived the whole thing remarkably well, even when the lock to her bungalow jammed when we took her home, and we were stuck outside in the cold for about quarter of an hour waiting for the warden.
She had been taken to the church by a specially adapted taxi with R, A and V, and she also came to the refreshments in the nursery bistro, which coped splendidly with about 200 people. She got lots of attention, and it was a nice occasion. Richard and Mandy both gave good tributes (read by the vicar), and the service featured the Shipping Forecast, by special request of Peter. No-one knows why, but it certainly got people’s attention.
The taxi did the same return journey with Angela & Co, but we met them at A Ethel’s, which is how we came to be involved in the jammed lock situation. After we go tin and they left we stayed with A Ethel for a while, but she was nowhere near as badly affected as we thought she might be. Ironically (I suppose) I received an e-mail while we were there telling me that our friend Jan Miller had died of cancer at the age of 64. Totally unexpected; we had no idea she was ill.
On Saturday we had booked to go to a Riding Lights performance at Lowestoft, but the tickets never turned up, and Dot was coughing quite badly, so we decided to give it a miss instead of ringing up and demanding action. Not very good on their part, though, especially as when I originally tried to book, their website malfunctioned. Spent most of the day finishing off my sermon on Jesus’ temptations, which I delivered on Sunday, of course.
On Sunday evening we met Heather, Simon and Sam at the King’s Head and progressed to the Ali Tandoori for our usual Indian meal. Miraculously, Dot did not cough while eating, though she did have quite a lot of red wine. Had a really good evening: we get on very well with them. Pity they will soon be going to Bournemouth: Heather has a job at the university there (she is already commuting) and Simon is looking for one in the area. Sam is due to go to Chester University next year, and his band, The Upgrade, is playing at the Waterfront next month.
Monday afternoon saw another Paston event: a cafe conversation led by Elizabeth McDonald at the White Lion Cafe. About a dozen took part, and it went well: I was able to make some contributions. Kay Riggs was there, as was Adrian Ward, which was nice. In the afternoon Dot and I did a mammoth shop at the supermarket and ran into Barbara Vidion, which was also nice.
