Cutting remarks

Last night I was grateful for a bit of a grumble with Rachel who's also been finding human error a bit of a trial. I give thanks we know better really, and know that those who don't can't help it... Finding folk exasperating is a wonderful opportunity for one's own personal growth anyhow...so we really should be grateful!

I give thanks for Jenny cleaning the windows and for seeing the sea pretty in the wind through them. I give thanks for getting some internet jobs done, and some eating of food brought by Tesco's. I'm grateful I had such a large late lunch I don't need to think about tea...

I give thanks for thinking I'd solved a fabric cutting conundrum, then cutting some more and thinking I'd actually made a hash of it... and then at the bit when it all seemed to be making sense again deciding to leave it alone and check again later... or tomorrow maybe.

Not the type

I'm grateful I've chosen to be grateful - if I hadn't I might not be you know. I'm grateful I've no one to whinge to, as if I had I suspect sometimes I would! I'm grateful I know every time you reiterate the negative way you feel about things the more it is compounded in your own head, and really there's no need to pound it into anyone else's as well.

I'm grateful going to knitting seemed important as I wanted to give a card and gift to someone there and that she appreciated it had been hunted for in charity shops. I'm grateful there was a card for someone else to sign too, someone new to meet, a cup of tea and a biscuit, a book to bring home and a spot of knitting done but there are days when nattering is beyond me so I'm grateful everyone else could talk amongst themselves. I'm grateful I'm not a monkey - I'd be a rubbish groomer!

I'm grateful for coming home, taking my boots and coat off and going straight to sleep. I'm grateful I lay down first! I'm grateful for a cousin saying she'd send me a book...well, she typed she'd send it. Even better for me!

Summertime...

...and the living is breezy! I give thanks that it's been pretty easy too, with no pain that didn't fade when I ceased doing whatever caused it and not too many things to do that couldn't be ceased...

I give thanks for pottering to the patter of rain and lounging in the lounge catching up with a few TV programmes I enjoy. I give thanks for horizontally watching the treetops sway, and when upright enjoying the changing colours of the sea. I give thanks for peppers roasting for my tea.

I give thanks for the internet entertaining and informing me, and for finding the work of these admirable artists...the little girl's cat is enchanting too!

http://twistedsifter.com/2015/03/art-by-blind-painter-john-bramblitt/
http://twistedsifter.com/2014/09/autistic-5-year-old-expresses-herself-through-art/

Bear with me

I give thanks for making a little bear...and for making a little bear a little less bare! I give thanks that, apart from the odd spell, I can spell...

Not feeling at my fittest, I give thanks for taking my hobbly wobbliness down to the seafront to partake of a take-way tea...and for the gap in the cloud to enjoy it. I give thanks for the mizzly rain and whiny wind, but for the overall pleasant mildness.

I give thanks for taking an addressed padded envelope to Luders to purchase something seasonal and pop in the post, and that when I said I was off to buy some tape to close it they passed me their Sellotape holder. I'm so grateful I live in such a generally friendly spot...and for the chatty folk about comparing notes on its charm.

I give thanks for making enough gorgeous Greek salad to have two days in a row.

I give thanks for lapsing into consciousness now and then...and I'm grateful some people will be aware that's exactly what I mean!

Couch trip

It's been a busy few days for me so I've been grateful that this one's been not! I'm give thanks for getting up late and gradually getting the essential chores done, including a spot of eBay shopping which isn't but is fun just the same...not least because you can do it lying down!

I give thanks for the cosiness of listening to the patter of rain; for watching cloud roll down the hillside so I could pretend the top was a mountain; and that it made the day so dark even pleasantly pottering with creative things ground to a halt and extra idleness could ensue.

I give thanks for tasty Cauldron 'Cumberland' sausages and for Coach Trip making me laugh...

Dairy me

I give thanks for a deep hot bubbly bath last night with a pile of new books to choose from... and for a beautifully written Louis de Bernieres being just the one I felt like starting. I give thanks for finally persuading my tablet keyboard those were the words I wished to type!

I give thanks for the smoothness of a new made bed, the silkiness of well washed Egyptian cotton, the snugness of covers and the howliness  of the wind...

I give thanks for a morning when I could mostly just lie there enjoying more of the same...and for doing just that.

I give thanks for an afternoon of nattering and nibbling cake with Jenny, Linda, Biddy and Julie; to Jenny for driving me to and fro and to Julie for giving me some vegan cookery books. I'm grateful I've cheese for my tea just the same!

Making it up

I'm grateful for not waking up at first hint of light in the sky. It's something I trained myself to do in the darkest part of the year but it's far too early in spring!

I give thanks for realising the fabric I bought yesterday was in amounts suitable for a non directional pattern (which is what I'd meant to buy but had been lured away) not for cutting bits out all facing the same way. Something had been niggling away at my brain about it so even though it was too late to change I was grateful I'd worked what it was. I'm grateful I was sure I'd come up with a way round the problem and, of course, even more so that I did! One design works well width ways and there should be enough cut like that, and the other I think I can get away with having the back and front going different ways as though they don't match it's close enough for me.

I'm grateful I went to a big Boots to look at make-up. As neither my hands not my social life function that well these days I hardly ever wear it anymore, but they had a special offer on and so I decided to check out all the wonderful things other people put on their faces...before giving thanks that they still do the Natural Collection range and I was able to buy some light tinted moisturiser, non lengthening non thickening mascara and lipstick that's almost the same colour as my mouth so for minimum effort I can look like me on a good day when I'm not...

I give thanks for looking round some new to me charity shops for a gift for a friend and finding some new to me things for me instead. I give thanks for the longest slowest traffic jam I've been stuck in for years - I really needed a rest and the views were pretty! Since I got back I've been grateful I've nearly got clean sheets on my bed..but another rest is needed before that gets completed.

Estuary English

I give thanks for last night's comfort cottage pie with a veggie bottom of course and a Tesco's bubble and squeak top...

I give thanks that when Rachel's phone said she was leaving in a month that's not what Rachel meant at all! I give thanks for a poky treatment and for lying on the sofa afterwards with Louis Theroux and a throw instead of throwing myself into action at choir.

I give thanks for feeling a good deal better today, well enough for riding around on trains by scenic estuaries... I give thanks for fabric shops close by stations!

I give thanks to Waitrose for giving me a take away cup of tea after supplying my favourite Cauldron sausages and cut price scones...and for hailstones landing in it to cool it down!

Even more

I give thanks for a little less pain today, which is particularly good because being incarcerated and immobilised is beginning to make me depressed and depression makes pain worse and vice versa. However decorative my cell and familiar, though invisible, the torturer. this level of discomfort and social isolation is the kind of thing people sign petitions about... 

I give thanks that I'm very good at sleeping at times like these and that I have a bed to do it in...and, as there's been lots of extra sleeping, that if I carry on feeling better and manage to do less of that and more of other things I might be able to change the sheets tomorrow!

I give thanks for finding this article by Stephen Fry about loneliness, and even more that he doesn't seem to be now... http://www.stephenfry.com/2013/06/24/only-the-lonely/

I give thanks that I do like my own company, and that I'm getting better at dealing with the fact that other people tend not to... also that I believe in time time I'll get better at dealing with not being able to do the things I like to do by myself.

I give thanks that I made it to knitting, very late but in time for a cup of tea - well two in fact! Feeling lame metaphorically as well as literally for taking no knitting to do, I was grateful I met Laura there and was able to help her with some word processing instead...

Pain drain

I'm grateful my hot water bottle sprung a leak in my bed - well it could have been so much worse, you know!

I'm grateful I'm good at remembering things can always be worse...and today I've had worse pain and stiffness than I ever remember with my joints, tendons and muscles. It would be an exaggeration to say every one of them hurts but most of the ones involved with any kind of movement at all including just moving my head, also holding anything, sitting, standing and lying still... so I'm grateful for learning some new levels of perseverance. 

I'm grateful for getting some bits to eat, a couple of naps and numerous comforting cups of tea...and for trying a few other activities just in case the desire to participate over ruled the difficulty. It didn't but I'm grateful I gave it a whirl...

I'm grateful for an internet window on the world via my tablet propped up on a pillow...books and TV remote control have been just too hurtful to contemplate, likewise knitting though this raised a chuckle http://www.viralnova.com/knitting-fails/

I'm grateful chuckling doesn't hurt though I've not done a great deal today...yet. (Things can get better too...)

Power trap

I'm grateful for having very little motivation most of today - it's actually a fine way to be if you're in a lot of pain. I'm grateful for remembering I bought crumpets yesterday when I went into the kitchen this morning wondering how I was going to cut bread, and I'm grateful by the time I felt a bit better it was too late to do much anyway thus maybe saving myself some more of the same tomorrow...

I'm grateful for knowing when you're cross or miserable or stressed or depressed, it is you who make those emotional states - not situations you're in or other people's actions or attitudes. Of course it's always much easier to assume you have a cause or perpetrator to blame, but the downside of thinking that someone or something else creates your moods is that you deny your own power to sort them out, or just ride them out maybe...

I'm grateful for the sunny spring day - ideal for people who have weekends to do weekendy things. I'm grateful for some pink in the sky and a reasonable forecast tomorrow for those who're doing them twice...I'm grateful some may be doing them at a happiness cafe http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-31979967 while others might be meeting about the bush! http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-31939776

Water off

How does a weather goddess get to see an eclipse? From her bedroom window through a handy filter of cloud, of course! I give thanks that I was sure if I sat there and gazed into the murk it would appear ...and it did! 

I give thanks for attempting to make the best of the rest of the day even though it's been painful and painfully convoluted resulting in more gritted teeth than grins. I give thanks for a blue-out of sky and sea making it pretty pointless trying to get the horizon horizontal...

I'm grateful my water bill is lower this year. I can't have a meter so this can only happen if the charges come down at source, and despite my generally eco-conscious ways, this means more money to heat it up for baths I'm afraid. I've always said baths are the next best thing to hugs for those for whom such things are very rare, so I was grateful to read this and see I'm not the only one to have noted that effect http://www.thebookoflife.org/the-consolations-of-a-bath/ 

I'm also grateful for a 'refund' for something landing in my bank account although I'm not sure quite what and neither is my bank, so I'll just have to see if it's retracted instead. I'm grateful I know not to spend pennies until you're sure they're in the right place...

And last, but by no means least, I'm grateful I still think I'm lovely. Many people have found many ways to demonstrate their difference of opinion over the years but I'm the one who's stuck around so it's my assessment matters! It's not quite water off a duck's back yet but definitely more 'Whatever!' now than 'Whatever can I do to make it better?' I'm grateful I keep right on doing to myself as I would have others do to me...time to put the water on for a bath I reckon, don't you?

Hunger management

Yesterday's dawn was peachy in the mist, but this morning's just a whiter shade of pale. I give thanks for seeing both, and that the sun was even slower than I at showing its face today as lots of extra snoozing was needed before I was up for getting out of bed. I give thanks for catching it just as it was setting behind the hill just now, a golden ball surrounded by more of that peach mist, and for the burgeoning buds on the branches.

I give thanks for peace to potter sporadically and apparently successfully with creative projects, a seam or two here, a row or two there; for the internet and a novel to entertain me in between.

I give thanks for a delicious omelette for my lunch, and for finally thinking of something for tea - I was getting really hungry and my menu mind was completely blank! I give thanks for freezers, fridges and cookers and for having an appetite.

Temperature rising

There are places round here I tend to only go to if I have to, and the reason I had to today was that I had to go somewhere so I was grateful they were reasonably accessible! I'm grateful I suffer from cabin fever and that the effects of my other maladies make it so much worse so that sometimes, even though it hurts, and isn't a bundle of fun on my own, I just have to give into the urge to get some blue yonder asap...

I give thanks for the mildness so that there could be lots of sitting down between buses as well as on them, mild enough to take my coat off and sit on that! I give thanks for all the blossoming blossom, especially the beautiful magnolia, and the sight of all the folk enjoying the sun, even if hearing and smelling them wasn't always quite as enchanting!

Despite the desperate need for a change of horizon sometimes, the vast majority of places I can easily get to make me very grateful when I get back to the particular friendliness and emotional warmth of here. I'm grateful I also managed to get some bits and bobs I couldn't be bothered to try to find on my travels and share a chat and chuckle at the same time. In Superdrug an assistant was helping a customer find a product she'd bought before and thought she remembered the brand of 'Maybe it's Maybelline...' she suggested!

Tea treat

Ee by gum, I'm a mite fatigued today... so I'm grateful there's not been a tremendous amount to try and achieve, and the nearest to tremendously important things have been achieved anyway...

I'm grateful to Rachel for treating my irritation, and then making me a treat of a tea with delicious homemade spicy bean burgers. I'm grateful we went to choir as lots of people didn't and as there was a new piece to learn it was necessary to sing our socks off...and do rather a lot of laughing as well. I've always been fascinated by the way squiggles and dots on paper can make meaning in our minds, but it's even more amazing that different ones can make us produce particular sounds... sometimes even the right ones!

I'm grateful for a 40% off offer on something I wondered if I could afford,  a message from Bob and a very friendly Tesco delivery from two young women as the designated driver one had a bad knee.

I give thanks for listening to neighbours enjoying the pleasant weather, watching a crow selecting perfect twigs and the glow in the hazy sky at sunset time. I give thanks for the legacy of wandering and lust...
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/features/exotic-england-a-celebration-of-the-nations-boundless-curiosity-with-life-beyond-its-shores-10112079.html?

Not waving

I give thanks for pain killers and getting more sleep. 

I give thanks for taking my grey mood and achy joints down to the sea instead of to knitting. I'm pretty good at serenity, and not bad at courage either, but the wisdom to know which is required is sometimes in short supply, and inflicting grumpy wimpiness on others is neither necessary nor productive I find...besides my hands are too sore really to knit today anyway. I'm grateful they were making waves yesterday, a recurrent creative theme of mine...I give thanks for murky and cold weather too as I certainly wasn't in the mood for watching other people have fun in the sun!

I give thanks for holes in hoardings so you can see what's going on behind. Painting or other artwork is good too and both is probably my fave. I give thanks for reasonably good blood test results for me, nothing that should require immediate intervention or a total abolition of favourite flavours anyhow. Which is good because I also give thanks that my Mother's Day chocolate has arrived - Seed and Bean do make exceedingly good chocolate!

Moithering Sunday

I give thanks for my Mother's Day breakfast in bed - I had to get it myself of course but breakfasts and beds are still things to be grateful for! I give thanks for managing to uninstall some Chrome update or add on on my tablet which I don't remember installing in the first place but had been driving me nuts by going extremely slowly and crashing all the time. I'm grateful that meant I could stay in bed surfing instead of swearing...

My bottom half joints were too sore to go out anywhere and the top half ones in too much pain for much in the way of crafting, and I wasn't in the best of moods so I'm grateful I thought of starting my Jacek Yerka birthday jigsaw puzzle to soothingly while away a few hours... until I realised it won't fit on my jigsaw board! I was grateful there was a plan B - to watch the film adaptation of a book I loved as a child which I'd been saving for some Sunday afternoon. This turned out to be too dreadful to give my full attention so I ended up knitting as well but making mistakes which had to be unpicked... and battling with balls of yarn determined to prove chaos theory and string theory both at once.

In what way am I grateful about this? Well, it's all pretty first world stuff isn't it, and it ties in nicely with a book I'm reading about which I'm grateful for in many ways, not least for revealing there is a museum of failed products...
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2012/jun/15/happiness-is-being-a-loser-burkeman

Oh, and being moithered by the day gave me an instant pun title for today's post... that's always something to be thankful for!

Mail's pace

Physio wisdom for those with a fluctuating health condition is to pace yourself when you have a "good" day in case you wear yourself out and have a bad day to follow...but any patient I've ever met with fibromyalgia, ME or the like knows you can have ninety three bad days in a row for no obvious reason and when there's an OK one you want to use every last moment of it you can!

I give thanks for less joint and tendon pain at least for a few days this week, and thus getting more done with less fatigue. I'm grateful yesterday evening, even though the phase was coming to a close, keeping right on going right to the end and having a clean and tidy of the living room and kitchen so that when I eventually left the bedroom it would be comfier to do little today. I'm also grateful for starting a knitting idea as well, even though it's the kind where you can't wait to do the next row and see how the pattern progresses. This makes for very sore hands but plenty of motivation so that I keep going back to it whenever I feel I can do a little bit more...pacing myself I suppose!

I'm grateful for rummaging around in the back of the fridge for things to eat...and that this is a less risky business if you're not a carnivore. I'm grateful for the washing machine doing the washing for me, and the TV programmes I recorded sending me to sleep. I'm grateful I've not made it to the Post Office so don't know if there was any Mother's Day mail for me...

Mull of attire

I give thanks for finally getting round to taking out the tricksy laces of my those splendidly colourful handmade boots. I'd told the saleslady I'd have trouble getting the footwear on and off threaded the way she'd done them, but she said they weren't long enough to work the other way and I could see they were quite short so thought I'd persevere. I have the same problem with some Kickers' laces and they do limber up a little even though my extremities don't, but at last I took them out to measure up before searching for a new pair, trying a spare too long to compare...and discovered the existing ones were perfectly long enough to criss cross lace actually - it just needed to be done! I am so grateful for the saving of money and future effort...and have promptly re threaded my Kickers too!

A few weeks back I was grateful I seemed to have found some fabric I've been looking for for years and today have been even more grateful now a length of it has arrived. It's that very fine light cotton that is used to line dresses and tops commercially but you never see in the shops. Apparently it's called 'mull' and the same firm sells coloured cotton lawn and voile at very reasonable prices for all your non slithery lining needs. 

I give thanks to Tamsin for a really good idea where to look for something else. I'm not sure if I will actually find it, but I can see it is a very good place to look! I give thanks that Tamsin is my cousin and thus of impeccable pedigree and perspicacity so she will merely snicker and maybe send a smiley wink if she should read this post!

I give thanks for the murky mist turning to wind and rain and for having to go out in it and get some bits and bobs - always up for a bit of weather me, and the sea was so pretty! I give thanks for sensible clothing and a warm dry home to come home to...

I give thanks that for almost a week now it's been quiet in the flat next door - the same people are still living there,  just not all of them at once and the noisiest ones are the ones who are away so life's been a lot easier all round...except when I watch scary things on TV. They are much scarier without the reality check of party wall sound invasion!

Having the foggiest

I give thanks for the orange mist yesterday evening with street lights tinting the fog, and that it wasn't worth making a detour from the recycling buns to see the sea because I could see you couldn't! 

I give thanks for a day with nothing medical to attend to - no appointments, procedures, treatments of deliveries - it's the first one for five weekdays in a row so had felt like a holiday! I give thanks to Roxy for inviting me to join her at a workshop but the first part of the day the place I just had to be was bed!

I give thanks for reading more about the thoughts of Stoics which I'd only the vaguest notion of before - it's strange to see the way I think about things set out as an established way to think and, given my general tendency to avoidance of labels, odd to realise I am something without aspiring to be! I'm grateful my research also led to me discovering a project with an alternative take on what news stories offer us http://thephilosophersmail.com/ and the associated fascinating Book of Life http://www.thebookoflife.org/ 

And talking of books and life, I give thanks for the life and work of Terry Pratchett, including his work in drawing attention to the struggles of dealing with early onset Alzheimer's, and the moral dilemmas around assisted suicide.

I give thanks for taking a picture of the skirt I bought so that if I manage to turn it into a dress I have a 'before' photo, but if I make a hash of it I have a picture what it looked like before to try and put it back together again! I usually have a few ideas of how to turn the images that appear in my head into the end results but they're usually quite hazy on the details...

Looking the other way

I'm grateful even though the full moon is long since past and the last couple of nights have been cloudy, there's been a gap for beams to shine through and light up the sea. I'm grateful it's been mild enough to have my bedroom window open a chink as I love to hear the wind howling through.

I give thanks for a very grey and murky day, just what I wanted for staying indoors and focussing on progressing projects. There's no such thing as bad weather, just inappropriate attitude you know! I only really looked out of the window once, downwards at the precise moment the delivery driver was looking up and, as I'd not heard his van that was something to be grateful for too... I'm grateful for the NHS for paying for my medical needs and Interlink Express for bringing them to the downstairs door.

I'm grateful for my new iron gliding smoothly, for bubbling brie on toast and for not reading things properly so that a style of bra seemed to be called 'Godless', a man spent thousands of pounds looking for the 'litter' of a dead kitten and dogs can get lost without 'chimps'!

Stowing away

I give thanks for the soft light and the soft air...

I give thanks for a morning full of beans and schemes and bustling about, and after that state of being passed by, an inert afternoon almost completely devoid of movement or interest in anything at all. I give thanks for understanding little I physically do matters a lot anyway, and for not having to listen to anyone spout platitudes to the contrary.

I give thanks for knowing all phases pass - the ones we perceive as good times and those we do not - and that our perceptions are largely a matter of choice. I give thanks for Earl Grey tea and McVitie's digestives, for inadvertently coming across the philosophies of Seneca and the thrill of recognition.

Pressing matters

I give thanks for finding what seems to be a just right iron in one of our little electrical shops in town. I give thanks for that despite it being a little town it has a choice of electrical shops. 

I give thanks for the wonderful colourful things we've made so far for our library decoration scheme - Dorothy has made a brilliant cushion (literally and metaphorically!) and Jenny a knitted pot of crochet flowers as well as an almost complete chair back and another one started, but we're postponing the display as others have said they do want to do things too but haven't had time yet. I give thanks this gives me time to finish a couple of other things myself (I hope).

I give thanks that despite sore knees this morning I've been fairly energetic again today, though I'm very grateful I made tea for tonight yesterday so that it pretty much just has to go in the oven and I can attend to some almost overdue paperwork and wait for Rachel to come and help me eat it. It's a dish I love that's somewhat high in potassium so I'm grateful I've someone to share it with.

Bang on

I give thanks for the mild weather the last couple of days...saves on the leccy bill for one thing! I suppose having the iron blow up does the same thing but I have to admit I'm not nearly as grateful for that though I did give thanks I wasn't holding it as the time (the bang was a big enough shock!) and that I'm resourceful and am sure I'll find a way to get a replacement despite the complication that not 'any old iron' will do  - it has to be one light enough for me to handle.

Contrary to the popular assumption that I'm always upbeat. I've not actually been particularly grateful for much at all this weekend apart from the fact I've had no one to inflict my glum and grumbly mood on. I gave thanks for being able to stay in bed and sulk and sigh til late today, though I did note I was not in nearly as much pain as I have been of late and felt gratitude for that, even though I still didn't cheer up and get up and get on with things...apart from asking the super powers of the universe to come up with a catalyst for change.

Thus I give extra thanks for a timely invitation from Laura to join her walking Chumba - or to be more precise to drive Chumba somewhere and go for a walk together while she hurtled through the undergrowth! I give thanks for thinking to take a flask of tea, some madelaines and a little picnic rug as there are lots of seats with stunning views up there. 

I give thanks for finishing this panel when I got back...though I've so far made a hash of attaching the back I'm very pleased with the front...

Saving my bacon

I give thanks for a spectacularly somnolent twenty four hours; for making my bed and lying on it, in fact for lying on or in it a great deal when it hadn't been made as well!

I give thanks for a great deal on Tesco finest scones too so that I've had hasty tasty snacks to hand both savoury and sweet. I give thanks for something almost as quick for my tea cobbled together with random bits of veg, bacon style Quorn and cheese...

I give thanks for the murky start and finish to the day so that I've felt I've not been missing much, and that during the  gloriously sunny middle when sometimes on a weekend day I wish I still had chums to take me for a pootle, I was very grateful I didn't and could be as lazy as I needed to be.

Travel iron

I give thanks to Chris for sharing this link on Facebook - http://elitedaily.com/life/culture/wanderlust-gene-people-born-travel/953464/

Apparently there's some evidence to suggest that some of can't help our almost constant urge to travel, explore and investigate and we're not likely to grow out of it and settle down as most of us have probably heard we should!

Unfortunately, unless there's chauffeuring and back up catering services involved, even going out three days in a row locally is tough for me now so I was grateful that the reason I had to leave home today was an appointment for intravenous iron, as that might help me to recover quicker! I'm grateful I remembered to include the lady who administers it in my morning metta practice as, even though she couldn't get the needle in again and her boss had to take over, her boss did succeed and we could have a little bonding session while the stuff went in so that hopefully we're less likely to tense up the moment we see each other next time...

I'm grateful for something edible and affordable in the hospital restaurant and the beautiful views on the sunny bus ride back. For passing a man doing tai chi on his cottage lawn, and for the 'Isn't it nice to be home?' feeling when we reached the sea front here. For the finger picking blues busker on the Triangle, my cheery neighbours calling out hello as I passed and delicious Devon ice cream on the beach. If you can't go very far very often, what a splendid place to be still!

Nothing dentured

I give thanks for doing rather a lot of nothing over the last twenty four hours. It hasn't really been a conscious decision but there's been quite a bit of unconsciousness involved! I give thanks for realising when I couldn't move at all that it was only a dream, and that I haven't had to move much when I've been awake either.

I give thanks for hearing the waves in the night, and seeing the bright moonlight.

I give thanks for bright sunshine this morning warming my flat through the south facing windows and for discovering, when I went out, that it was a lot colder than it seemed so that I didn't mind coming back soon and not loitering.

I give thanks to my dentist for remodeling a 'tooth' from a fragment of one and a broken filling, and to the NHS for paying.

Sight for sore knees

Last night I gave thanks for seeing chickens being put to bed with the aid of torch and for the moon shine on the sea. I gave thanks for the enjoying the aftermath of cleaning without the exhaustion and pain after I've done it myself, and for just enough mildness in the air to leave a window open a sliver to sleep.

Today I've been grateful for a little less soreness and stiffness in my lower half which meant I could give my top half a much needed rest, lay down the knitting needles and go out mostly just for pleasure, but with a little bit of practicality tacked on, rather than the ratio the other way round as is often the case. The practicality bit was putting some things in the big recycling bins and I'm grateful I could see the funny side when a combination of stiff hands, a stiff breeze and a sloping car park meant that small plastic containers went running off down the hill and had to be chased and brought back!

I give thanks for going a little way into our splendid 'lost garden' park...I can't remember the last time I did, though I've wistfully paused at the entrance a few times wishing I had a companion to offer an arm on the steep bits. I was grateful to see primroses, a violet or two, some nearly out daffodils and some definitely out hawthorn nearby, but my favourite bit is the mixed up tree tops when you look up.

I give thanks for finding a portion of homemade parsnip, sweet potato and chick pea stew in the freezer. They're ingredients I have to eat sparingly now so I had half a bowl with bread and butter and filled up with a scone and jam and cream...and was very grateful for that!

Pot Luck

I give thanks to Jenny for coming to do the strenuous chores and to a Tesco delivery to top up grocery supplies. If it hadn't been for the need to get out of bed for those two I'd have probably stayed in it, so as well as the contributions they've made to my comfort I'm grateful for the extra upness. I haven't stirred far from the sofa but I've been grateful for a quiet day to quietly do a little knitting and sewing up, and I'm also grateful I'm a very rare knitter in that I actually do enjoy the sewing up and finishing off part as well. 

I'm grateful for a text from Christine to check I'm OK as I've not been to choir for a while and to tell me where there's pretty spring things to see nearby, and I'm grateful that a kind man at the new fabric place I found last week has said he'll send replacement samples as the last ones went astray, not due to dodgy local characters or slapdash delivery office practices, but to Google autofilling my address without a vital line and neither I nor the company noticing...

I give thanks that Bob never had tantrums like the little girl next door and that so far her relatives have refrained from violence or leaving her home alone. I'm grateful when I go into the kitchen I'll hear her less and there'll be lots of choice of things to eat with little effort involved. I'm grateful I'm not on dialysis and can eat as and when and as much as I like...

Oh, and just when I'd put away even my belated cards and considered my birthday over for another year, Jenny brought me this little potted plant and I'm very grateful for that as well!

Stirring stuff

I give thanks for stirring myself last night and making a stir fry. One of the advantages of cooking for one is that you only have to chop for one too!

I give thanks for feeling more sprightly today - every time I've had that jab I've felt knocked out the day after but there's always the sneaky suspicion it might be something else instead so it's nice when I know it's not.

I give thanks for the bright blowy morning and resisting the urge to go out and watch the wind whip the waves up as I had some relatively energetic things to do indoors and it's either or. I give thanks for watching neighbours with gardens enjoying theirs, and for doing some house plant gardening instead. I give thanks for seeing a big pile of dumped detritus by the bins has been removed.

I give thanks for making a yummy pudding at lunchtime. Another advantage of cooking for one is that you get to eat for two! I give thanks for Doves Farm organic wholemeal self raising flour - you can't beat it for not having to beat it much yet still have things light and crisp.

I give thanks for the peace to drift off into a digestive nap this afternoon, and for waking up thinking it must be late but before realising it was just dark clouds bringing squally rain.