Summertime

Summertime and the living is easy...

I give thanks for a day of really quite astonising idleness. I didn't even wake up properly until half past ten on my phone...which was a shock until I remembered it would have automatically switched to summer time...Breakfast was so late it couldn't even really be called brunch...more like afternoon tea!

Yesterday was quite vigorous for me so I knew I would probably be tired...and, funnily enough, that the weather would be far less appealing too! I'm grateful I had planned acccordingly with nothing actually planned...I've spent ages on the internet looking at places to go and how to get there when I'm up North, including when and where to meet Bob. And also beginning to collect the little odds and ends I'm thinking now it would be a good idea to pack, as bright ideas like that tend to surface well in advance and then again when you're away from home and remember you forgot....

So I've been grateful for the internet and my research capabilities; for peace and quiet apart from the sea which is rumbling away again today and the will having a bit of a howl! For the unexpected tinge of gold on the clouds as the sun broke through just in time to sink beneath the horizon and the rich blue of the sky as evening drew in. For a long hot bath with a book and a supper half home made half ready made in the oven waiting for me to finish this and settle down for some more of the same delicious relaxation...

Beautiful bay

What a beautiful part of the world I live in! I'm so grateful I decided to go out in it today and that the sun started shining brightly just as I left and disappeared behind thick clouds again on my return...

Humungous gratitude for public transport (on time too!) and for thinking to get off at the top of a hill so I could walk down to this view instead of up! You could say it's sad that I'm beginning to reason like a bus pass holder not a coast path walker but as long as I get to be there somehow sometimes I'm not complaining...well not much anyhow... I'm frequently in pain and often exhausted but give me a cup of takeaway tea and a scenic place to drink it and I can be these and still be happy too!

Gratitude for leftover pastries from cooking on Thursday to take out for my lunch...and for leftover filling for the pastries which turned into a very good omelette when mixed up with egg. That, after eating that, I've just about enough energy left to turn the leftover pastry into a quick dessert with some leftover mincemeat in it... Are you detecting a theme here perhaps?

I give thanks for a little light retail therapy (had to be light - I was carrying it!) including some alternative cream for sore joints. It there's an alternative to sore joints I'd be even more grateful of course...And for a surprise visit from the Easter bunny delivering some tasty chocolate surprises from Bob! As I wasn't expecting this (well, it wouldn't be a surprise otherwise, would it?) I had made sure I was well stocked up with other sorts of chocolatey things so there'll be those kinds of leftovers soon too... It's all good!

Star awes

I'm grateful I managed to change the dining room light bulb before it got dark and without  getting the big ladder out, surviving the wobbly stretch on the small ones...and also that the light bulb I dropped changing the bathroom one survived its ordeal and worked!

I'm grateful I decided (at last!) to watch Avatar last night as as my post acupuncture away with the fairiness really enhanced the animation and effects...then when I went into the dining room I discovered they were in there too! The lampshade has starry cut outs but, although I've had it for five years, because it's always had an eco bulb in before I'd never actually seen the pattern they make all around the ceiling and upper walls... Particularly awesome in that mental state and far more so in reality than I could capture on my Streak...

I'm grateful it's Bank Holiday and I haven't had to go anywhere or do a great deal but that I've done the things that needed to be done....and even a few that didn't but I wanted to. I'm grateful I have no visitors or invitations because I've worn myself out with those activities and have been stuck in horizontal for the last couple of hours. I'm grateful my Streak works in horizontal...but equally that the cooker doesn't so I do have to get upright in a min and get some grub!

Much thanks for my bun in the oven breakfast and other similarly undemanding menus today. I've been watching Come Dine With Me while I've been awake...that's energetic enough! Also for the sight and sound of the very rough and rumbly sea and the huge buds on the tree outside...they're really ready to burst open if they don't blow off first!

Fair exchange

Much gratitude for not only hazy sunshine but also some mildness in the air today...would be pushing it to say it's warm but nearer it than it's been for a while...

For the jewel colours of anenomes...flowers I've loved since long before I could say their name! For having a little local fruit and shop where you can treat yourself to a seasonal regional posy or two...and a sunbeam landing on the vase and making them really glow...

For getting up in time to make some tasty pastries to take out for lunch...and Rachel being so pleased that I did! For the just-what-I-wanted biscuits that she'd brought along too...and other mutually delightful exchanges, including acupuncture for fees of course!

For this story about an inspired change of use for a confiscated car http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-devon-21952104 and for the kind women who had been waiting even longer for me for a taxi home offering to share so that I got a short scenic trip out as well as a ride home!

Extra mature

Today I'm giving thanks for...

...an afternoon nap yesterday that livened me up a little for the evening shift. For the slow cooker for cooking my tea and an early night by candle light...because I felt like it not because the power was off!

...Jenny's help and company, and a trip down the town here afterwards to get some odds and ends and enjoy the general ambience of the place. For my joints just about surviving the cold and making it home in time to thaw out with a saag aloo lunch before another nap! It was kind of encouraging to hear other people say the low temperatures made them extra achey and stiff...but not that they all seemed to be so much older than me!

...no one being hurt and or stuck for too long due to the landslip on the Ness...and that no one else in the locaility needed any emergency services while the rescue was underway as there were so many chaps and appliances attending the scene...

...some leaflets and samples I ordered arriving extraordinarily speedily...even the ones from Germany...

...a sofa, a heater and a TV. Sure I could want for more...but just now what good would more do me?

Lazy daisies

Much gratitude for several hours of hazy sunshine today...still very cold though and the sea looked like a snowfield! I give thanks for date and cinnamon porridge for breakfast and discovering a new way to cook eggs that I shall call 'froaching'  as it's breaking them into a pan and putting a lid on so they steam sets the top. Highly recommended...

That trialling some prototype urostomy bags for a manufacturer didn't prove too much of a trial... they were pretty good actually!

For rethinking rejecting a less-than-half-price-in-the-sale Joe Brown's dress on account of its plain brown flocked spot front panel and adding a little pattern...

For good old lazy daisies - an embroidery stitch that looks good even if you don't do it well. And for having exactly the right colours to hand from trying out those crochet squares...just needed to split the ply which wasn't hard to do...

And for this great grow-your-own flower garden Lynn sent me... I have become mildly addicted!
http://www.procreo.jp/labo/flower_garden.swf

Me and my shadow

By 'eck, it's a bit nippy still isn't it? I give thanks that I have power and appliances and the money to use the former to keep the latter running and keep myself physically cosy, backing up that warm glow of oxytocin producing interaction over the last few days. Also that I was blessed by the sight of a very rare thing this morning...a shadow! I wouldn't say the sun came out exactly but the cloud did thin a bit for a few minutes earlier on today...

I'm grateful for getting a little hard work housework done such as ironing and tidying up the cupboard under the stairs. And for coming up with an idea for a very lightweight craft project too...it may even be finished tomorrow if it carries on going according to plan. Yet again I give thanks for ready made puff pastry - fresh tasty snacks and puddings handed to you on a plate (well almost!). I'm particularly grateful that I've left enough strength in my wrists to operate the remote control to catch up with catch up TV as this evening I think that, running the bath water and turning the pages of a book may pretty well be all I do!

Happiness is a warm dog

I've not been feeling physically on top of the world and this morning rather down in the dumps mentally too...so was grateful for the chance to practise not Oh no-ing and Oh woe is me-ing but instead just being accepting of the now that was and open to whatever it became...Finally I decided to get up and make a cuppa doing a little light energy cleansing in the corners, under the bed and so on while the kettle boiled. Then I sat down and picked up my phone which was on silent and at that very moment had an incoming call! It was Laura asking if I'd be up for looking after Chumba for the afternoon as all the humans were going out and Tilly, her own dog, isn't always the perfect canine hostess. Great gratitude ensued - look she even matches my decor!

My furry friend was very keen to visit the communal gardens to check out the messages left by the local dogs and leave a few of her own so I was grateful for the opportunity to get my wellies on and squelch through the mud out there! I gave thanks for finally discovering why I've kept a large solitary sock for a couple of years. It's evaded recycling several times although its partner left to make itself a new life long ago, but clearly this half of the pair was waiting to be a dog toy!

I also gave thanks for seeing Abi and Aril, and the delicious home made marzipan and apricot pastry that Laura brought me, for copious amounts of garlic beforehand to get my appetite going to appreciate it, and for my fingers finding the zoom on Firefox which my head had forgotten how to do!

Snow seen

Having been largely out of contact with the outside world for the last couple of days it was astonishing to see on the internet all the tales of snow woe and flood damage around the country. Much thanks that this picture of last week's picturesque fall is all I have to add...

Gratitude to Peter for his hospitality and nurturing nature, that he had to go into the city for something this afternoon so I had a lift home part of the way and that, although we had to turn the car round twice for accidents blocking the roads, our own journey was safe and simple. I was especially thankful that, despite not aiming for any particular departure, when I'd popped into a shop by the station and queued by the machine for a ticket, I arrived on the platform at precisely the same time as a through train home...

I was grateful for the scene of the awesomely awfully flooded flood plain and the jumpy lumpy sea and that after complaining politely to Tesco that their 'specially chosen for you' grocery coupon they sent me were not for on line shopping, they sent me a £10 voucher that was!

Cut to the change

Well, let me see...what can I give thanks for since last I wrote my blog? Lots of change the last twenty four hours plus...including a random on the spot dress swap with Rachel...and a change of plans with Peter that meant we didn't go out on a jaunt today but practiced hibernation! I give thanks for the weather that increased the sense of this being a very fine choice!

I give thanks to Bob for a  bunch of movies he put onto DVDs a while ago for me that I felt a bit guilty about not watching before but which were a perfect thing to take on a hibernation break somewhere with no TV, to Keith for his excellent homemade plum jam, and for all the catering and waiting on that Peter is doing for me...including spreading said jam on toast and bringing it to me in bed this morning and knocking up a very nice nut roast dinner last night. There are rumours of crumble later...

This Friday this time last year I was in the recovery room after my big op, drifting in and out of sleep with a big grin on my face after hearing how well it had gone. It's not the kind of surgery where you compare scars with other people but I would like to express great gratitude to Mr McGrath for doing what seems to me such a neat and nimble job and for this year of change and challenge. It's easy to forget when you're caught up in your own drama of illness and unwanted physical outcomes how these amazing people rise to their own challenges day after day in pursuit of your further health and well being. Maybe it's because I've done so much craftwork over the years but I'm in awe at the fact they take our lives in their hands and cut and sew our body parts with no option to unpick their stitching and patching and start again, day after every working day...

Aah, I hear the car of the head hunter/gatherer...I must away to be pampered some more!

Windows wonders

This morning I'm giving thanks for windows and sheets...

For softly disappearing but fascinating dreams between the sheets, and soft sheets wrapped around me... And glass windows: letting in light but keeping out rain. And the sound of sheets of rain beating on the windows...and not having to get out from between the sheets to look out of the windows first thing, but resting a little to recover from the rigours of yesterday. Doesn't take much rigour for me to need to recover these days but I'm very thankful for what rigour I've got...

For practising some energy medicine techniques to get me gratefully if groanfully out of bed. For every time I remember the present moment IS and taking issue with is a waste of it. For throwing money at the wind and rain and booking a taxi to acupuncture and one afterwards to the station. For the fact that I'm going to be going on a train right beside (or maybe slightly under now and then!) that wonderfully wavy sea...

For discovering studentbeans.com's World Weird Web...compilations of images of all sorts of stuff...weird and wonderful, fascinating and funny...

And for Windows letting me share these pleasures with you. May you be pleased to read them and find pleasures and wonders of your own...

Light life

Goodness me...look at the time! It's so light in the evenings now it's easy to forget where we are in the day - something for which I'm very grateful as I do find the long hours of darkness rather dreary sometimes. I give thanks for the changing light in the mornings too, not just the dawn breaking earlier but the changing colour and quality of the light as the sun's angle changes. And, on clear evenings, being able to see the sunset from my kitchen window without having to climb half out!

I'm grateful too for changing the quality of light in my flat after a bulb blew in the bathroom and took out the lighting circuit. High ceilings, wobbly floors and old fashioned wire and Bakelite fuses make this an interesting exercise for one with my infirmities...but the plus side is that I feel so proud of myself when it's done, and so thankful I've been able to do it!

I was grateful that when I went out today I didn't get wet, and that I managed to save my broccoli and stilton pasty from a marauding and remarkably persistent seagull and was able to eat it looking at a not dissimilarly coloured sea.

I give thanks for some home cooked supper from out of a freezer bag and that when I gave the jacket potato in the oven a squeeze just now it was just the right combination of crisp on the outside and soft inside. Mmm...my mouth's watering!

Left, right and centre

Last night I gave thanks for it being mild enough to have the bedroom window open a crack. This morning for the dazzling light rain showers and warmth of the fog streaming in my windows...good job you don't have to learn the names of weather phenomena from meteorological forecasts eh? Splendidly springlike it was here 'til well past noon.

I've been grateful for the busyness of the day...it wasn't what I had intended and I must admit I didn't greet the opportunities for activity with the quite the enthusiasm I might have, but what's done is done and I welcome the stilling into simply being as evening is drawing in. In the occasional sitting downy bits I finished off crocheting the first prototype square for my next project...but I'm still fiddling with the middle as you can see... I'm waiting for a new book of patterns to arrive but in the meantime I've made up my own, though I'll give thanks for fresh inspirational material when it arrives. Seeing the way others have gone can clarify your own choice of direction...by hook or anything else for that matter!

I give thanks for knowing and accepting that, due to some quirk of formatting, even though the photo above is centred on my draft...it will appear on the left when published. I apologise if this seems all wrong to you...just strive to be centred about it!

What goes around

Brr...I give thanks for it being chilly enough in the shade today to still need that chunky jumper...but also that when the sun came out it was warm enough to unbutton my coat and take off my hat and scarf while sitting out of doors. I'm grateful for the energy to go somewhere else for a little while today...just along the coast a way to a place that's not too bustling out of season. In fact I think there were as many birds and fowl around as people when I arrived, including some gorgeous iridescent black ducks new to me. I thought 'I know! I'll go to that cafe with the water wheel that's always so crowded in the summer.' Well, it wasn't crowded because it was shut...but that did mean I could have a good look at the wheel without tripping over tourists. It is one of the biggest in the country apparently but difficult to get a good angle for a photo as if you step backwards you are on the road and there's a van parked immediately to the left of the shot so I couldn't move sideways either...

I gave thanks for a rather tasty bowl of soup and later for a large cup of takeaway tea for only 70p! Surely the cheapest anywhere around? Kept me going til I got home which was good as I was too tired to make another for quite a while afterwards! I give thanks for a magnificent laze on the sofa for the rest of the afternoon which I think may extend into evening too. Part of the reason I went out was because I was running short of fresh veg...but having hunted and gathered them I see no reason to feel under any obligation to actually cook them as well. I'm grateful for fish fingers too you know...

Picking it up

Been thinking about what I was saying yesterday about not thinking about things getting worse regarding a domestic problem and well, there's nothing on earth that gets better for worrying about it is there? Illnesses in particular...in fact a lot of mental and physical problems are actually exacerbated by stress...so why do people do it? Why, why, why...oops...worrying about that now, ha ha!

Practising what I preach, I've been ignoring all the whys and wherefores about feeling so tired this weekend and have been grateful to be getting in touch with my inner kitten..curling up in the warm and playing with balls of wool! I started by tidying up the leftovers from the various yarns used in my jumper, and then I went to put them away in my out-of-the-way wool store which is a zip up holdall on a high shelf...a bag I discovered was not zipped up when I dropped it trying to get it down! There was a huge tangle in there which I've been enjoying sorting out...up to a point! Plenty left for another day! I'm very grateful that I live alone and can make great mess in the cause of tidying without impinging on anyone else's mental or physical space...and that I've had no visitors or invitations out anywhere to hinder me from making things (slightly) coherent again...

I've also been experimenting with ideas for some crochet squares I want to make. There are so many patterns out there and I've had hours of fun picking out the bits that take my fancy and seeing if I can put them together with some of my own ideas to make a pattern that fits the remit in my head! I'm grateful for the simple sedentary pleasure of this...and that when my hands seize up, as they do after a while, I can do less enthralling but still essential things like washing up! Much gratitude for discovering recently how to start working in the round with a 'magic circle'. If you crochet and you don't know about this look it up immediately!

Great thanks for the astonishment of snow this morning. I potter about without my specs on for hours sometimes and I'd vaguely noted with surprise the sudden crop of daisies on the lawn... it was a long time later when I realised they must have been a light dusting to match the heavier layer on the hill behind the town! And for making the long list of the Fish Short Memoir Prize...I am delighted with this and please don't assume I'm not and say what a shame and stuff. As I wrote at the time...the important things were a) that I entered, b) that it inspired me to write and c) what it inspired me to write about. Anything else is a bonus but kind of irrelevant. I give great thanks for not needing more.

I give thanks for the food on my plate, the bodily skills, utensils and appliances to put it there...and the appetite to take it off again in the appropriate manner! For remembering the little things matter...

Seeds of change

Gotta give thanks for all the episodes of X Factor and Britain's Got Talent I must have watched over the years...the better enabling me to appreciate Simon Cowell's 'wedding' on Comic Relief! The people I didn't recognise must have been in more recent series I guess... grateful I've missed those though!

Also for the very good film Made in Dagenham - a true story about Essex girls changing the world. And to Peter for recommending it to me. And Catch Up on Sky without an hdmi...

For the stripes on the sea...milk chocolate brown nearest land after the heavy rain, then pale turquoise and finally true blue on the horizon. Add a sunlit seagull and you see why so many artists live in the South West! Lots of play of light and daskness in the sky and underneath it to enjoy today...

For the seeds of change... I keep a jar of mixed seeds on the spice shelf in the kitchen. Good for all sorts of things, especially mixed with cheese and baked on top of a vegetable dish. When the jar is empty I love to fill it up in separate layers of sunflower, golden linseed, poppy and sesame and then it's like an ornament til next time I want some on my food. And then I love to shake it up and mix them. It's good, I reckon, to enjoy making order out of chaos...but good to make a bit of chaos too!

Speaking of which I'm grateful for not making either a drama or a crisis out of something merely, at this stage, untoward. Anything can get worse and sometimes some things do...but seriously, why make it so beforehand in your head?

Don't mind if I don't

Usually I find the comments section on any media article appallingly exposing of the misery and venom lurking in the hearts and minds of many. But this morning I found these fascinating offerings on celibacy, mostly from celibates interestingly enough - I don't know if there's a connection there! Gratitude one anyway...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21739640  

There is a connection to the title of my post of course which I'd already chosen last night for entirely unconnected reasons to do with not preparing any food for my tea...not even some veggies or or salad on the side - just heating things up. Lushly lazy!

I could tell from the state of joint seizure yesterday evening that I wouldn't get a lot done today either...and gratitide two: I don't mind if I don't! Talking about 'overdoing' things is something I find very lame (no pun intended!). It's such a pampered first world concept: that we might choose to do more than we possibly could...when most of what we do is so impossibly non-essential anyhow. If you're reading this you are, if not in the lap of luxury, at least standing close by it and holding its hand! You've never had to run for your life have you? And hand to mouth is what you do with the nibbles in front of the TV? Me too! I have nothing to complain about either! Bit of pain, bit of life limitation...so what? Gratitude number three!

Sometimes I choose the post name after I've written the post, sometimes after I've published it with a different title - which provides an exercise in non-attachment as I do prefer them to be 'right' but refuse to change them post posting because I think that would be extra posey and sad...and implies that they were not right in the first place! What I love best is when I some random inspiration comes for a title and then the gratitudes fall in to fit it...gratitude number four for this phenomenon!

Thought you might like to see a photo of the jumper. Basically any photo of me between now and proper springtime temperatures I will be wearing this...I love it so much! The rough idea came to me during an acupuncture session (on the treatment couch you see behind me!) and I carried it around in my head until I could carry it around on my body...but I still don't understand quite how I actually managed to turn a vague idea into a woolly pully that fitted the criteria and me by winging it rather than working things out and writing them down. Gratitude number five that I did though...and I don't mind that I don't!

Feast your eyes

I give thanks for the gloriously clear and sunny weather today...though I'm grateful there was still a nip in the air so that my cosy new jumper was necessary! I was grateful for great acupuncture and using some of the brain fluff time afterwards to go on a bus ride to a nearby town where clusters of people stand outside pubs on the main street smoking in their track suits. I kid you not! Not very therapeutic but they have some good sewing and knitting shops and it's a very pretty ride with headphones on...otherwise you might have to listen to locals discussing recent times they've beaten people up! This too is no exaggeration...between tunes that's just what I heard today! Moving swiftly on, I give thanks for the beautiful scenery, the sparkling sea, the estuary and the moors...and all the interesting things you can feast your eyes on from the top of a double decker bus like the passenger alighting with a large oil painting of sunflowers today. I give thanks for my good fortune and good management in coming to live in such a beautiful part of the world...but not in the town down the road!

I give thanks for getting what I went there for without too much ado, and being home and snug as evening draws in. I give thanks for the little miracle that is tea and toast...breakfast to suppertime it hits the spot for nutrition and nurture, doesn't it? I'm also grateful that Tesco have extended their veggie curry options...I can now have tarka dhal with my sag aloo and pilau rice...a positive feast for my tummy too!

Flowering

Thanks this morning for the pastel stripes of the calm flat sea. For having my Streak back and working...my much loved pre multi app smart phone infestation Streak with its ancient Android system that Adobe Flash will work on. I went straight on the BBC website to look for some bit of video footage to watch (just because I could!) and found a short film about a quest to find Britain's holiest sites that visited Penant Mellangell. I was wondering if it was the place I remembered...which had a sort of semi circular chapel extension lodged in my mind from a single visit many years ago. It makes no difference what or if you believe...some places feel very special in a way hard to express in words, and this is one of the most special I've ever been to. No sign of it in the first few minutes and then they went in to it...talking about how special it was. Lovely bit of serendipity!

I'm grateful for having worked out what the ends of the ties on my jumper will be like. It was all made and sewn up and I started at the top of one tie with no idea what the bottom would be like. I was even crocheting the flowers with no idea how they fitted into the scheme of things! 'Tis a funny thing but I've knitted myself four things since my diagnosis with cancer and all have had crocheted flowers on them. I knitted many more things before my illness and they didn't...very bizarre! Much thanks to Ainsley Harriot for providing me with a cup-a-soup at lunchtime so some headway could be made... And for giving up on trying to get the photo centred!

It's five years almost to the day since I first realised I was ill. The doctors took some months longer, of course, as is indeed often the way. They can't take a patient's word for it as many people are not at all patient and insist they are far more poorly than in fact they are! But anyway, I knew and thus I consider myself to have passed the five year mark now, which is a bit of a milestone and I give thanks for that. I'm grateful for the handful of friends who have been with me on my journey...well, not even a handful really...more like a pinch! And I'm grateful that the ones who couldn't hack it wandered off so I didn't have to be looking after them as well as myself. And for those I'd never have met if I had stayed well. Especially today for Carole. I think of her often and hope all her family but especially DJ and James have fared well this passing year since her passing. A fine lady. Honoured to have known you Carole...

Give us a break

Well, yesterday was a very busy day and I'm grateful for all we got done! Lovely to have a slow relaxed morning today though, basking in the sunshine streaming in the windows and only hearing the wind. When I say 'morning' I mean well into the afternoon...but eventually I got my proverbial into gear and started on the many tasks that awaited me. Some of them involved going into town and I was very thankful it was a mite warmer than yesterday. it was even possible to be on the sea front for longer than the (literal) minute manageable then, admiring the waves which were smaller but still breaking quite enthusiastically in the weak sunlight. I was actually able to get a camera out of my bag...but not hold it (or myself) steady in the gusty wind! 

This evening I'm giving thanks for leftovers so I don't have to cook, and a pretty little mini sunset visible from my kitchen window without needing to lean out precariously. It may be wintery cold folks but the days are drawing out...

I wrote my blog so quickly yesterday I forgot to express my thanks for my Mother's Day card which arrived on Monday, and for Pat and Laura wishing me a happy day on the day itself which was thoughtful of them. The Wilkinson's £3 Thornton's chocolates I bought myself went down a treat instead of dessert last night so I'm grateful I was such a slacker and didn't get round to opening them on Sunday! Still some of those leftover too.

Rough trade

Brr! I give thanks for the sight of a few flakes of snow and a very rough and fluffy sea. For Peter not only driving me to the recycling bins but putting the stuff in them for me so I could stay snug in the car. That he is doing a spot of carpet fitting for me and I am turning up some trousers for him. For packages coming with new things I've had a yen for...and Simon in customer service being so helpful when one thing didn't fit. I'm grateful that I've really very nearly finished my jumper now, just the trimmings to make and attach...and that I made tea last week and froze it so a short pre-dining siesta might just fit into the day!

Implicitly (almost)

I gave thanks for the misty moisty weather yesterday...ideal for interspersing naps and TV with some work on that jumper I'm making. And thanks for the predicted cold snap spurring me on. Thanks that I stopped before my arms actually fell off...though they did keep causing everything I picked up to fall off by the end of the day! I managed to spill my supper twice - encompassing the curtains, the carpet, a throw and my leg and was very grateful it wasn't tomato soup!

I was trying to think of something to do in the evening that would really rest my wrists and digits, shoulders and elbows. That precludes craft work, housework, typing and internet activities on laptop or phone, or even holding a book, and I hardly ever just watch TV...so I was delighted when I started on the first of the five episodes of Mayday I'd recorded, more in hope than anticipation as I'm sceptical of the actual charms of anything advertised and hyped. And wow...deserved a good deal more of both in my opinion. Haven't found anything so gripping that's not in a Scandinavian language for many a moon. Admittedly I haven't watched it all yet but much thanks to all who participated in putting that gem together!

This morning I gave thanks for the sound of the wind and rain again, the roaring sea...and being able to see it! This afternoon for another session of jumper finishing so that I have now reached the construction stage and it is beginning to take shape. I'm particularly grateful I'm pleased with the shape it is taking...I trust my design skills implicitly (almost)...

I'm grateful for a good long natter with Bob, including beginning to make plans to meet up when I am up north next month which seems rather bizarre to us both to be true but also rather pleasant! Ooh and I give thanks for my cauliflower cheese in the oven...awafting its aroma to me and reminding me to get a move on and put some veg on to go with it. 

Lucky stars

First thanks of the day for this story of nostalgia and love...and the tender face of officialdom. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-21719848

Today I've been giving thanks for knowing when it's time to stop, and top up on rest and sleep. I can approximate a fully functioning human for a day or two sometimes, but then... it's not even really that I consciously choose to snooze, I just become repeatedly unconscious!

I'm grateful for the comfort zone I've made of my home. For having a home come to that, and understanding how to make it comfortable for me...but also for knowing if we don't push the boundaries of our comfort zones they shrink and become restrictive.

I'm grateful for Judy Collins' cameo performance on Girls. Yes really (for anyone of an age to know who I mean!) And by 'eck did she look (and sound) good on it! For a moving and beautifully filmed documentary about a Hutterite community in Canada.

A friend said I was lucky the other day. Never mind the context but it was in the 'it's all right for you' category of comment which we all slip into sometimes when we spot something in someone else's world we rather fancy in ours. I've not often been called lucky and it made me think...Yes I reckon I am. I'm lucky because...I think I'm lucky! To think you are fortunate is a fortunate thing indeed. I give great thanks for that.
Also for this pretty little handmade necklace I found in a charity shop a little while ago but which has defied several attempts to photograph. The seed bead stars would have had my fingers twitching years ago as it's very much the kind of jewellery I used to make, but nowadays they only do that if they go into spasm! I am extremely grateful I didn't find the pattern in a craft book as that would have been most frustrating. Just goes to show how lucky I am!

Little issues

Extra thanks to Rachel today for the lingering effects of some extra good acupuncture yesterday afternoon. It had been a rush to get the town chores done and my bags had seemed especially heavy when I finished so I'd asked her to be gentle and work on some soothing points...but while I was lying there with the needles in I remembered I'd a prescription still to pick up and fulfil so I was up and out and at it again before I knew it!

I'd planned just to bliss out on the sofa when I got home but after a little of this various activities seemed far more appealing so that I ended up having a very busy evening and, after an extended lie in, was bustling about this morning too...I really appreciated the extra energy and motivation, the doing and the getting things done.

I'm grateful I bought a Big Issue. I only do it now and then but there's always something interesting to read which often leads to other pleasures or pastimes. It was there I saw the advert from Human Writes for instance...today I saw that a favourite author had a new book out.

I give thanks that Laura suggested going to see an exhibition in the city that had rather taken my fancy too, that we enjoyed it, and a glimpse of some of the other fascinating exhibits in the museum ...and tea and very yummy cake in their cafe afterwards. And that after that we did what we could to kick start the economy in stores like Primark and Wilkinson which both had just exactly the items I had gone in there hoping to find!

I'm grateful I've had such an active week and the prospect of a little light lazing to follow...

Light work

Freddie Parrot Face Davis apparently...the one who was sick sick sick up to here.  I had to look it up and I'm trying to remember if this was anything to do with being as sick as a parrot and if he was a 'Comedian'. There used to be a TV programme called the Comedians (in case you didn't know what it was the participants were trying to achieve!) I suspect many would not be thought funny now...or it wouldn't be considered polite to laugh if you did. Fashions change, tastes differ, but let's all offer a humongous thank you for humour especially when it's not derogatory or unkind.

I give thanks for almost being at the armhole of the second sleeve of the jumper I've been knitting for a couple of months. No photo as, due to the ribbing at the top, they look odd without arms in!  You'll just have to trust me they won't look odd with arms in...and, come to think of it, I'll just have to trust myself as well! I'm grateful I can still knit a bit, and sew a little, only have to follow a pattern if I am in the mood...and can put ribbing wherever I like!

Thanks for fresh raspberries for my supper...never mind the air miles, the smiles on the faces of the staff in the little local veg shop are ecologically sound I'm sure. And for the mist turning orange over the river in the glow of the streetlights last night...bit more of a conurbation down there! And for the thick white fog this morning...can't see the river, can't see the sea, have to know exactly what it is you are looking for to make out the end of the garden! I love fog...so beautiful and so much better to be on the pavement in it than on the road!

I give thanks that Jenny came to help with some of the heavier work today...so that I could spend a couple of hours on the lighter chores like writing letters and filling in forms and that when I come home this afternoon there will be an illusory sense of all being under control!

Sick up to here

Thank you again for all your well wishes...My sniffles have subsided now, almost a dim memory. I found it rather interesting having something so medically minor and mundane, albeit intrusive, to deal with for a while and found it fascinating how much attention it got! Nothing changed my opinion that colds are funny, but I think that got lost in translation somewhere. I may try harder to get my point of view across should it happen again...


You do know, by the way, that the opposite of my blog ethos is true, don't you? That dark thoughts and dismalness are as contagious as any germ?  The body also has some difficulty distinguishing between things you are just thinking about (or watching or listening to) and things that are actually happening.  It's for this reason that try to limit both my intake and output of descriptions of health problems and misery in general. The papers, radio and TV, social media and many a simple conversation are full of spin that seems designed to make you anxious, angry and sad. It's not that I'm especially susceptible because I'm quite good at visualisation (You probably can't begin to imagine how well I imagine things!) - your body reacts too, maybe imperceptibly, but it does. Nothing is 'all in the mind' and if you are physically malfunctioning in some way  it's an particularly fine idea to try to ensure your mind is as well as can be.

My mother was quite ill health obsessed but it was only when I became seriously unwell I realised quite how much dwelling on it there is, how much eagerness to swap 'sick' stories...ours or other peoples. Sharing and caring are all very well up to a point but there us a level at which, if we are not careful, we think it makes us more interesting or important or worthy of attention or happiness. Notice I'm saying 'we'...don't go off in a huff of assumed injustice, dear reader! I guess we evolved to do this so others might bear us away from beasts that consider damaged humans convenience foods. What doesn't kill us doesn't make us stronger but more manipulative maybe?

So I try to temper my references to physical or emotional distress with mention of something jolly that happened alongside of them, or that perhaps that I wouldn't have experienced without.  I know I don't always succeed but I think it's really important to try, to do my bit to counteract the passing round of suffering, especially when what I'm trying to do is pass on wellbeing and joy. I even attempt not to tell myself when I'm in pain or tired or whatever, just experience it and not create a narrative too as to me this feels a whole lot more...well...healthy! Easier said than done of course and I do understand that other people might not have the same aim in life...though to be honest, I'm not sure I understand why!

Anyway, I've given this post a title that will attract those that groom for gloom and maybe they'll get this far and consider other options! I started today very grateful that the disturbingly realistic and rather unpleasant dream I had wasn't real. And followed that with thanks that I sent a text to someone whose birthday it was although I didn't know and thus was reminded and could take appropriate action! There was much gratitude when I discovered my store of cards had something suitable for this and another birthday on the way, and even a little token gift. I'm grateful also that various forms of short shift work worked out...a little pinning, tacking and sewing, typing a letter and after print head cleaning getting my printer to print! I'm also greatly grateful for my daylight lamp for boosting the natural paucity today, and that the mysterious long strip of white approaching shore somewhat alarmingly earlier was not a tsunami but a long thin gap in the clouds illuminating a similarly shaped and apparently moving strip of sea...

That dog will be in a blog

Mmm...another lovely day! What do I mean 'another'? I mean another lovely day when I'm out and about...didn't want to waste my weather goddess talents on stay at home ones did I? Today I went on a long and lovely scenic drive with Jared, rambling our way through deepest Devon to the south Cornish coast and back. I give great thanks for my friends with cars who take me out from time to time and for Jared's great happiness in driving great distances...and he is quite chuffed that I'm so very good at weather! Mostly it was mild in the hazy sunshine, lots of snowdrops still about and daffodils too...tors and moors and lambs and horses and thatch and teddy bear shops...

We went to Looe because he'd never been and met Ash the dog who was sitting in the yard outside his cottage waiting for passers by to make a fuss of him. There was a sign up with his name and the information that he liked to play catch and when he'd caught one of his balls he would either climb up on the slate wall and drop it over the fence or, as he'd just done in the picture here push it under the gate with his paw. No barking, no whining, hours of fun for tourists and pet and presumably of peace for his owners too. That dog is will be in a blog, I said...And so he is!

On the way back we went to a couple of places I'd never been either, but which called to me as names on signposts or stretches of road on maps sometimes do...and which made me most glad I'd chosen them. And we managed to get through Plymouth without undue delay or emotional trauma, which (if you are non-local and do not know) is a rare and precious thing!

I was delighted to return home and find a message to say my original Streak (which did the phone equivalent of going in to hospital to have some reconstruction and coming out with MRSA) is now well enough, some months later, to come home for good. I have missed my proper Streak so much, and although I am of course extremely grateful I decided to buy a reconditioned substitute before I sent it away (I wasn't quite sure why at the time, but time did make it clear!) there will be a great welcoming when it returns.

I'm grateful to be home and snug with uneaten picnic for my tea, the bathwater heating, my blog written and no particular thing to do or place to go for a while. Just got to think for a title for this post and my work here is done for now...

It's an ill wind

I'm grateful the sunny weather some websites have been forecasting for the last few days hasn't materialised as I haven't felt much like even getting up and looking out of the window. But I'm also grateful I had my monthly blood tests today so had to get off my proverbial and go outside. There was a brisk old breeze but after my recent flopfest I did want to walk down the hill at least and I was rewarded by the stirring sight of high tide hurling itself on the sea wall...most invigorating...check out the plume of spray in the background...glad I wasn't walking along there! It was also cold enough to ensure I had the outdoor cafe to myself which, being an anti social so-and-so, I find especially pleasing. I did have to hold my teacake down while I drank my tea however or it'd have been half a mile inland before I got around to eating it!

I give thanks that after a few emails and phone calls the mornings mix ups appear to be moving towards a state of sorted... that my chores for the day are mostly over and that my tea is almost cooked and soon I can resume the snooze position...and relax...

Tear away

It's common with a cold to have runny eyes as well as a runny nose but yesterday evening I gave thanks for the things that made me cry real tears: Best Foot Forward...an inspiring couple made up of a dance therapist and her autistic partner who didn't have much speech but could communicate feelings to some extent by pointing to a variety of smiley type faces. When the Got to Dance judges commented on their performance they held up very smiley faces with the word 'excellent' underneath...a simple thing, yet very moving in its inclusivity. Later I watched a  Japanese film called Departures about an out of work cellist who inadvertently took a job preparing corpses for burial in the traditional manner and grew to love it and to love caring for the dead and their families. I'd seen this on the Sky Store list and thought Yes! My kind of movie...and it was!

I'm grateful for staying warm indoors again as the wind whipped up the white wave tops and the roar of the sea, for a lie in and then bustling around making brunch, doing the dishes and tidying up the kitchen before a quick bath and an afternoon of what turned out to be falling asleep! This wasn't part of the mental master plan but sometimes you have to go along with the physical flow if you are fortunate enough to be able to do so...It must be all the sneezing. Everything kind of stops just before you sneeze doesn't it? So you probably use a lot of energy starting again!

I'm grateful I've got my blog written and can now drift off again, though at some point I suppose I'd better drift into the kitchen and make some tea...I just need to tear myself away from Come Dine with Me...

 If there were a photo to accompany this post it would have to be taken from the inside of my eyelids

Small is beautiful

Today I've had a small scale stay at home day aiming for awareness and acceptance and doing useful things when my nose has stopped running a little bit!

I'm trying to cultivate loving kindness towards those who are combative or cross, to not be combative or cross in return...and to not think I'm superior for not being, or even trying not to be... Gee, it's hard but I am grateful I am trying nonetheless!

I give thanks for a good old Columbo TV movie for light relief...

for the stab of yellow blackbird beak in the gloom beside the hedge

and seeing a neighbour who's not been well out playing on the communal lawns with her dog

and the heart shape a self seal food bag makes if you turn it inside out

and the advert with all the little Hank Marvins...

Forever young

A daintiness of daffodils and littleness of leeks...Happy St David's Day to you all! Wear your leek with pride! Well not if you're an ostomate with a spelling problem perhaps!

Thank you for your kind thoughts. Yes, I do indeed have a cold I'm delighted to say and am thoroughly enjoying the experience! I've been coddling myself and cwtching up on the sofa and have enjoyed a little light (retail) therapy... buying a special kind of underwear for my chopped up middle, a special kind of glove for my ravaged thumbs and some special coloured baseball boots for remaining, despite what the start of this sentence might suggest, a teenage still at heart!

On my birthday afternoon it dawned on me that as I'd reached the age of fifty five without growing up or fitting the mould, I was probably out of the danger zone and was unlikely to have to go through this dreaded process. I burst out laughing with relief and joy... I rest my case...

I give thanks for all of the above, including the helpful and friendly people I spoke to on the phone when the internet couldn't answer my questions. For lots of tissues and scattered naps, for date conscious daffodils blooming by the fence, for my personal TV library with uncut auditions on Got to Dance, the funny fake penguins on the Spy in the Huddle and the oh so endearing real ones, and a fascinating programme looking at Britain's tiny wildlife through a high powered magnifying camera.

For this funny animation about rotund animals:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F99faLJYpo8
this short film showing sublime craftsmanship by a chap in Torquay. Yes, in Torquay...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdfreJmK9R4

And for being as persevering as a rockhopper and getting this post written despite Google, Android, Dell and my own ever runny nose and floundering fingers doing their best to sabotage the scheme!