Soft tissue

I give thanks for a kind member of counter staff in the chemist giving me a couple of tissues when I was sniffing and apologising for not having one. I give thanks it wasn't the snivelling sort of sniffing that time, just the drippy nose sort...though I am being a big softy at the moment and am easily moved to tears. I give thanks for regularly reminding myself it's OK to be this way and that wishing I was any different is as pointless as wishing anything else was. I give thanks for trying to be good natured and kind even when stuff seems trying and tough...even if I don't always quite succeed.

I give thanks for making some progress with the soft cotton crossover robe I'm making, partly for my hospital stay...and partly just because I'd like to wear it anyway at times when neither naked nor dressed seems right. I give thanks I find doing small hand stitching for finishing both soothing and satisfying. I give thanks for coming across a couple of very old Midsomer Murders I've not seen before. Yes, I know that's a bit of a sad thing to be happy about but I'm doing the best I can...

Weak points

I give thanks I feel better this evening than I did last night on my return or earlier on today. I've been giving thanks the kind of rough it was didn't seem kidney related, or even obviously exhaustion related, though it wasn't any the more enjoyable for that.

I give thanks that Jenny was already booked to come and do some cleaning as I really needed to do as little as possible so that was one thing I didn't have to do...and seeing the cleanliness appear around satisfied my yearning for nurturing a little. I give thanks I'm very good at doing without nurturing on the whole, unless I do it myself and for remembering experiencing such excessive feebleness will good practice for after my operation.

I give thanks the pigs have moved to pastures new...and from the state of the garden down there I reckon either they were being used to flatten the ground before the surrounding overgrowth was cut back...or some massive beast tore down the hedgerows and gate to break in and gobble them up. I give thanks my imagination is one of my strong points...

Not so silly

I give thanks for sleeping moderately well considering how poorly one does when one has to get up very early... Also for some delightful not quite sleep dreamlike meditative 

For dolphins leaping over the boat wake and shanty singers welcoming us as we disembarked...and barked again. 

A pair of ducks swimming in a cove and coming ashore to paddle on the sand. For a quick paddle myself. 

For little girls pretty in pink hurdling over the mooring ropes on the sand.

For an utterly brilliant reggae funk band playing live on a stage with a home made cake stall and grass to sit on in front of it in the sun and get the festival feeling.

For a slice of sophisticated deli quiche for lunch that I wasn't sure I'd like - salmon, goat's cheese and spring onion - but which went down a treat.

For more dolphins on the smooth crossing home and Gary actually getting to see some too

A pair of swans gliding in the pearlescent sea and sky scape as we ate delicious fish and chips found after my auspicious accosting of a local couple who were on their way to the very place to find them.

For being able to write and upload this en route as there's still a long way to go.

Bouquet of barbed

Well, as you know, I go through my day gathering bits of grateful... Sometimes it seems as if a theme or connection emerges and today, though grateful thoughts have been very sparse, the theme has been that I've not feeling truly thankful even when I've managed any at all. Every time I've remembered I've not had a grateful thought for some time and have tried to construct one there's been a thorn in any rosiness I've come up with...some buts... and some big buts sometimes.

I'm grateful I've tried to compose with some brittle wit or inspiring insight regarding this...er, but I've failed to do so. I'm grateful I've decided not to go through a rote list of stuff I should be grateful for, we should all be grateful for - our first world taken for granted luxuries - because I am...but saying it is still not quite feeling it.

I'm grateful for the awareness of fluctuating perceptions of stuff and situations. For the awareness that even the stuff we unswervingly think is unmitigatedly grim sometimes just has to be borne...sometimes all the time.

I'm grateful for the sound of bands playing on the back beach wafting up on the wind and reminding me of how it feels to feel you're having a good time. I'm grateful for playing a couple of Norman Cook tracks much too loud to remind people I think are much too loud much too much of the time not to forget how quiet I am. Not big or clever...but I do like a bit of Norman Cook so a bit kind to me.

I'm grateful for the relief of darkness falling, a hard day of the heart and mind drawing to a close. I'm grateful I can legitimately head off for a bath and bed very shortly as I've a very early start in the morning and whatever else tomorrow brings it sure as heck won't be like today!

IMBY

I give thanks for delving into the heart of darkness behind and between my cooker and the kitchen cupboards, and other murky crannies. Not really ideal tasks for a pre-op parastomal hernia patient...but they won't be ideal occupations during recovery either and I'd die of shame if I died under the surgeon's knife and there was muck and clutter lurking everywhere...well, if I hadn't died already of course!

These tasks, and associated domestic enhancement processes have taken up much of my day today, and as Bank Holiday weekends can seem interminably long and isolated I rather give thanks for that... plus realising it doesn't matter if I can't sell up and move on, there might money to be made here doing guided tours of life as it used to be lived...and is still lived by me, including plug in heaters and pull out kitchen appliances!

I give thanks for having some energy to rub and scrub and that I do love not only to see stuff looking clean and tidy, but also knowing stuff I can't see is that way too.

I give thanks for the cheery sound of pigs snuffling and rooting in the garden of the ground floor flat here...there used to be guinea pigs squeaking down there which I also enjoyed but these are the full on porky sort, and it's strange to look out and see not just cats and dogs and rabbits exercising in the private patches but full grown livestock too. On the whole I think the plot is too small and the situation utterly unsuitable but no one else seems to be batting an eyelid so, unless it's an outdoor elephant in the room situation, maybe it's perfectly normal nowadays like dishwashers and cars and central heating? Oh well, they can be another feature for the museum visitors...

That's the way

Nothing ventured, nothing gained...so I give thanks for nothing too unmanageable pain wise this morning and thus venturing forth to gain some more. I give thanks for a scenic bus ride to take away a tea and flapjack down the bay a way. Any road journey is a creep of faith in the South West this time of year, and any bus journey requires great fortitude with all my wayward variables so I give thanks for no undue delay or dismay occurring.

Still not in the best of moods, I give thanks for overheard conversations reminding me there are worse things than only having yourself to talk to...for the rich blues and greens of the coastline on a sunny summer's day; for flecks of brightness in the dark of the leafy woods, and brushstroke wakes of jet skis and power boats on the water.

I give thanks to Facebook for reminding me (and Liz!) of skies that caught our eyes today last year; to Bob and Jan for checking in and breaking up the social silence; to Colin for taking time to check my chuckle button still works, and that it does..it just keeps defaulting back to 'off' again.

I give thanks that neighbours have been out in the day and curiously quiet in the evenings just lately allowing me to watch TV in peace. Not that watching TV in peace is something I aspire to, but it's something to do when I can't do the things I do. I give thanks for remembering all things will change...even neighbours being curiously quiet.

The prettiest thistles

It's a nasty old attack of the darkness I'm having at the moment...I give thanks for coming across this article about the role of the immune system and inflammation in depression. The fluctuating state of my body and mind would a fine case study for someone I'm sure, but living it is a tad challenging at times

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-37166293

I give thanks for finding a link to the theme music of Magnifica 7o which I find rather cheerng though they could be singing about doing an oil change on a Volkswagon Beetle for all I know...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BliqScxpNRs

I give thanks for getting myself a new nightie from ebay to cheer up my hospital stay, and that I liked it so much when it arrived I've just ordered another the same. Finding 'sleepwear' that doesn't look as if it belongs in a brothel, a nursery or an old peoples' home is always a challenge, especially when you're going to be wearing it all day in a public place where privacy and pride are already in short supply. I give thanks for remembering an elderly lady who arrived on a ward I was on one time wearing hospital issue kit. The nurses were suggesting maybe someone could bring her an alternative garment from home or the shop but she was insisting she didn't wear nighties 'Is it pajamas you prefer dear? Do you like to sleep in pajamas?' they asked, several times, rather loudly (she was a little hard of hearing) 'Oh no!' She boomed back, sounding quite horrified, 'Nude!'

For this article reminding me why I wanted to be a social anthropologist - heavens, humans are strange creatures indeed...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/24/the-burkini-ban-what-it-really-means-when-we-criminalise-clothes

For those lemons I bought yesterday having the most delicious flavour I ever remember a lemon having...and for being able to satisfy to a sudden desperate urge for cake while watching GBBO with a warm buttered cherry scone, greatly baked by Tesco's... For these pretty prickly things which caught my eye on the sea front the other day and reminded me of the Hazards of Love

Past caring

Last night I gave thanks for steering a path to the land of nod between mountains of painful body parts and ravines of painful thoughts...and similarly to some semblance of useful wakefulness for at least some part of today.

I give thanks Waitrose think unwaxed lemons are essential as I do too...for the helpful assistant who ceased arranging veg and found some ordinary tea bags for me and the man behind me in the queue who didn't fancy the Duchy blend they had on offer either...even though it was free. I give thanks that when I spilt said tea it was on clothing that won't show the stain if it does so. For the crisp crunchiness of Dove Farm's exquisite digestive biscuits, bought at the health food shop but opened before I got home to have with it on the sea front. I give thanks for being such an unappealing companion, with spilling shopping and splashing tea and crumbling packet of biscuits, I got a seaside seat all to myself. 

I give thanks for having a quick natter with one of the friendly cab drivers on the way home. I resent having to pay extra for being in pain but less so if I feel I've had a few minutes communication as well. And talking of communication...round about this time of evening a year ago today, I received a message whilst 'internet waiting' that I first thought must have been sent in error since the person who sent it was so unlike anyone else I usually heard from. I give thanks when he reads that he will smile...

I give thanks for Magnifica 70 - sex and thugs and split screen caravanettes.

Odd one out

I give thanks for less pain the last couple of days so I've been able to get out more...though I'm moving very slowly and it swiftly catches up. I give thanks for fine weather so pausing here and there while it passes can be pleasant, apart from the usual odd one out feeling of being an odd one out among the couples, families and groups of friends.

I give thanks my hair is long enough and curly enough to twist into a topknot that stays even if I forget a scrunchie to hold it. I give thanks for the glittery water and the sea mist along the foot of the headlands. For the soft fronds of tamarisk of which I'm very fond...For a light, not too sweet lemon and poppy seed muffin on the back beach...and for the sweet unthinking of sleeping. 

Evening out

Ha ha, no! Read it with a slightly different emphasis... I do give thanks it looks a very pleasant one though, now the sun has come out and the wind died down...and for lingering a while with a 50p tea on the back beach on the way back from the library. I give thanks for going to the library and chatting and knitting a bit - my vanity in showing off my dress alteration outweighing my pensive, reclusive mood.

Last night was a ride of different emotions, though not a rollercoaster ride as that implies at least some soaring in between the sinking. I give thanks for hearing more of Laura's delightful good news and remembering what happiness sounds like; and then some neighbours reminded me what sex sounds like (plus bickering)... by which time I was so miserable I could only give thanks for neither weeping nor visiting the biscuit tin excessively; and then I watched a poignant Norwegian film about someone on a day's leave from rehab and remembered to put the malaise and melancholia of my own existence in the context of human existence in general... which sort of evened out the feelings a bit. A problem shared and all that...well, in a way...I was kind of grateful anyway...

I give thanks for writing the above and then accidentally finding the below, which may have been more the kind of thing you were thinking of when you first read the title of the post!

http://metro.co.uk/2016/08/22/someones-created-new-signs-for-night-tube-etiquette-6083293/

Tell me why

I give thanks for a Sunday drawing to a close. Some people don't like Mondays I've heard, but thinking about it probably if you don't like one at least you probably prefer the other... I give thanks for remembering that piano intro anyway!

I give thanks for managing to immerse myself in various distractions of varying degrees of purpose and point... I give thanks for household chores for masquerading as occupations with a meaning...but that I don't feel the need to vacuum quite as often as some folk do round here...

I give thanks for finally being satisfied with the sleeve heads on my slomo cardigan. For fiddling about mostly successfully with that dress alteration. For finding some iPlayer and All 4 stuff to enjoy...thank goodness for foreign TV!

I give thanks for fresh air blowing through
my open windows, and being able to shut them when the PA on the seafront blows in them too loudly too...

I give thanks for downloading some apps and loading up some bookmarks on my new to me phone which is exactly the right size to double up as a new to me tablet as well, as my old to me one, like my old to me phone, requires more coaxing to stay functional than I prefer. My new to me phone is almost as big as my Streak..and if you remember my Streak you're an old to me friend as well!

I give thanks for the smell of clean bed linen, and the taste of Tesco's finest clotted cream fudge.

Unpicky

I was woken up by cramp so many times in the night the time left for sleeping was pretty cramped too, so I give thanks there was no pressing need to go anywhere, nor even get up for anything until late today. My calves are still sore, which given the state of my hips and knees this week, has made horizontal quite appealing. I give thanks for the opportunity to practice not caring about not doing much.

I give thanks for having the wherewithal to keep myself fed and watered and mildly amused. For finding a novel to read at the library last week. This might seem unremarkable but I'd rather not read any kind of fiction than any kind of fiction if you see what I mean...

I give thanks for tackling a tricky bit of a knitting task (shaping and binding off a shoulder seam, for anyone who's wondering ) plus some finickety unpicking of seams in a ready made dress that needs altering. And as these activities made my hands hurt I should be grateful I've run out of useable limbs and just go back to sleep I reckon...unless or until I can think of something simple to make for tea!

I give thanks for the sound of the wind...for the softening of other sounds with earplugs...for the patch of blue sky that's appeared and grown while I've been writing this...

Moon on a pic

I give thanks for something yesterday I only thought of as I was getting into bed no, no...whatever you're imagining you're wrong! I remembered when I'd been walking up from the bus stop I'd been tired and sore so keen to get indoors in a way, but also with a very strong sense I couldn't face another evening home alone. I guess I have around 350 of them a year, and at least 300 follow a day when I've been on my own and precede another and sometimes, despite being (thank goodness!) very fond of my own company I could very much do with a change. So because of the aches and pains I took my laptop into the kitchen to sit down in between bits of cooking and as a result ended up having a conversation with someone who sent me a message...and then another conversation with someone else who did...and then another...all consecutively and all in all taking up about four hours so when I remembered my earlier plea to the universe I was very grateful it had done what it could to respond!

Later I gave thanks for the loud proud moon calling to be admired through the window, and making me get up and open the window to see it more clearly. I couldn't get my camera to focus except with the zoom...but my camera does zoom at the moon pretty well! For having my window open in the night and no earplugs -  the better to hear the rain when it started though of course I got to hear lots of other less desirable sounds along with it...

For sleeping eventually and waking late and mild manneredly sorting out various muddles to do with dates of upcoming things.

For the full leaved trees tossing in the wind today, showing off all their shades of green...For getting caught in a short sharp shower with the brightest double rainbow. I'm like a child with stuff like that, I laugh aloud with glee. Sometimes I wish I was better at life... but when I can get so much pleasure form such small wonders I wonder how much better than that a person needs to be?

Fuzzy logic

Sometimes between uploading my blog post for the day and putting fingers to keys for the next one, I find myself gathering moments and composing snippets in my head...Mostly I give thanks for this as it saves me sucking my metaphorical pencil and scratching my head, but this afternoon I realised I seemed to be storing up grumbles and grievances, so you can give thanks I caught myself and stopped. Well in pixel world anyhow...

I give thanks for doing as much nothing as possible this morning. It's not something that comes easily to me, in fact it's often as much effort as doing something, but my body really seemed to need more stillness...and my mind always does...so I did my best.

I give thanks for an easing of pain in the afternoon so I could go out and get some more. I'm not at all grateful for the way I limp and make wimpy noises when it's bad but these might have helped clear a space at a bus stop seat. It is my cross to bear and I'm not grateful for being cross when I bear it, but I do give thanks I recognise I'm grumpy and try not to blame other people...though this time of year there are a lot more of them around you could do if you were so inclined!

I give thanks I chopped some veg while I made a cuppa when I got in so next time I can face getting up there's less to do to make tea. I give thanks meanwhile I'm quite enjoying lying cocooned and curled up on my bed with earplugs in and my phone propped up on a book so I don't have to hold it.

I give thanks at least my hair is wild and wandering free... I give thanks to Jan for patiently putting up with my constant yearning to follow its example.

Sweet little lies

I give thanks for the bright growing moon in the graduated pastels of the sky, catching my eye and making me catch my breath in wonder every evening this week...bar this one. Tonight it's been about watching the 'Swiss mist' that rolls down the hill behind the terrace so that you can pretend that it's a mountain.

I give thanks for a wonderful low(ish) potassium fruit pudding I've made a couple of times now using tinned pineapple with dried blueberries, cranberries and cherries topped with sponge made with wholemeal flour and light soft brown sugar. I've been missing dried fruit dreadfully...Yes, I should get out more...see below!

I give thanks a phase of very bad pain has started when I have no very good things to do - some warm social interaction would be a delightful distraction but the only interactions on offer for the foreseeable future involve waiting standing and trying to walk in busy crowds or sitting about talking about pain. Walking, standing and sitting are the most painful things to do just now so I'm grateful no one else will get hurt if I say no to these. I wouldn't say no to talking to someone lying down at the moment so I give thanks for the internet virtually making that possible sometimes...

I give thanks for having words in my head to share with someone who isn't there to hear them any more...and then hearing from someone else who at least knows the feeling...

I give thanks for trying to organise one more 'one more treat' before hospital after the one I first thought of proved unviable. Even though hospital dates are as yet not set in stone they manage to be hovering over an awkward place to arrange anything around. I may have to make a miraculous recovery afterwards to try out all these ideas I keep thinking of!

Well off

I give thanks for a grayly starting day - sunshine makes me want to go out so much and I can no more go out and play every day than I could go out and work. I give thanks for staying healthy beyond even unreasonable expectations...and for accepting I still have work to do on not feeling guilty and a failure for never being really well. 

I give thanks for waking slowly from troubled dreams...but eventually full of resounding resolve to tackle various organisational tasks and chores...which of course counts for nothing if the people and procedures you encounter think you do too. Oh well, I give thanks for giving these matters my best shots and for trying not to be too grumpy with bearers of frustrating (lack of) news. On the whole I think it's good to be receive regular reminders of one's inconsequentiality...but wouldn't say no to a few more chances to forget just now, and much busyness still results in zzizziness whether the outcomes are successful or not.

I give thanks that cunning operation of coupons and vouchers has bagged me £60 of Tesco groceries and domestic supplies ordered for £40...and that I've tried to go easy with the lbs as well so as to be generous to the delivery person's knees.

I give thanks for the sea being rather oceanic today with crashing a good roar of waves on the shore; for the palest watercolour white of cloud streaks on the blue; for variations on a Pachelbel theme by the violinist busking on the Triangle...and, on a day when it feels as if my legs have been screwed on wrong at the hips...or maybe even attached with rusty nails...for this lady making me feel extra inadequate 
http://metro.co.uk/2016/08/15/elderly-woman-loses-prosthetic-limb-while-rock-climbing-contintues-anyway-6069134/

Testing, testing

Um...hum...well I've been a bit of a mardy little so and so lately so reckon the first gratitude has to be that no one has to put up with me for more than small stretches of time at a time...Couldn't even put up with myself last night, unable to stay awake to watch the tennis, so I give thanks for the whizziest pre-sleep routines and rituals before lights out and instant falling asleep.  I give thanks for catching up today...with the match and the undone washing up.

My joints being rather creaky, I gave thanks for a lift to town from Jenny to do a few bits before knitting...and an eye appointment cutting the knitting bit short. I'd been assured by the orthoptist a standard eye test was required but the optician declared all was the same as before...luckily he's a droll young man with the softest Northern Irish accent who always manages to charm a bit of good humour out of me so not an utter waste of time.

I give thanks for the brisk easterly whipping up white tops on the dark blue sea. For discovering if you have a distracted moment and put a large bag of peppers in the top drawer of the freezer instead of the bottom drawer of the fridge you can still whip them out and roast them. For the company who sold me my new second hand phone suggesting if I took the tiny protective strip off the battery contacts it might work. Doh! Didn't see that...and as I've never had a phone battery with a tiny protective strip over the contacts I didn't think to look...

Change of a dress

I give thanks for remembering there's tennis at the Olympics in time to watch a bit...and for the bit I watched being very good! For remembering to look out of the kitchen window at the appropriate time to spot some sunset and seeing clouds in fascinating shapes and colourings.

I give thanks for happy dreams of moving into a new home where all seemed full of promise. For making the best of a Sunday which didn't really...

I give thanks for taking advantage of this home and taking a book and a blanket through the lushly overgrown shrubbery to the communal gardens for a stretch out in the sun...

I give thanks for putting the last few hand stitches in the second of these two adaptations of one shape I like, and like to think is flattering to my shape...and some progress with other creative projects. For finding some words to say...

Throw in the towel

Never mind the calendar, there's definitely an 'Aaargh!' in this month. The last few of days in particular I've been beset by so many minor mishaps, mislayings and malfunctions it's getting a little wearing on all ready rather worn down spirits.

Hmm...but that's not actually giving thanks though is it? I guess I should be grateful that everything I try to do is taking at least twice as long due to these difficulties...as that makes just half as many things that might go wrong! Oh, and that despite a slight reputation for eloquence I'm not adverse to conversing with the universe in very short words now and then.

I give thanks for a good deep sleep last night and some excellent dreams...including a long sea voyage during which we came upon a barn in the ocean so we knew Ireland was not far away, and a return visit to Flam.

I give thanks for Mima suggesting yesterday we did something later today so I could justifiably take it easy in preparation...also that, as I'm trying to make a kimonoesque garment for my upcoming hospital stay, I could justifiably doss around in a nightdress most of the time the better to get the feel of the design and construction process!

I give thanks for winning protracted battles with my printer and my lunch, followed by a little nap and then a dash down to the seafront to do what we said we were going to do ie. meet on the beach for a swim. And that despite saying I probably wouldn't do any actual swimming I actually certainly did!!! Not a lot, as the water was a tad fresher than we had imagined (but suspected, since only very small and/or wetsuit wearing were in there) but first to launch out to a full horizontal from a cringey shuddery, trying very hard not to use those short words loudly, wade into the depths, and some actual strokes completed.

I give thanks for finishing this in time for a hot chocolate at Eastcliff before they closed...and for popping to change my wet bottom half in the loo and finding hanging over the wall nearby the towel I'd left on the steps going nowhere at lunchtime yesterday, and understandably thought I'd not see again. I give thanks for the utter awesomeness of living round here :-)

Turn offs

I give thanks for lots of pain today so I could get out of a few things I really didn't feel like doing. It also meant I couldn't do a few things I did want to do, but I'm grateful I've done a lot of that already the last couple of days... which might have a lot to do with being so sore and tired. I give thanks the things I did do required a variety of positions and movements so I could turn the hurting off a bit in one place and deal with it somewhere else instead.

I give thanks for some texts and messages from a few different people...which is unusual...and nice.

I give thanks for the exceptionally glittery sea and so many gulls whirling on the thermals I'm surprised they didn't crash...

I give thanks I was delighted with an eBay win of a little ultralight fold up down jacket ready for any more small adventures coming my way...and for my new second hand phone which I'm sure will be wonderful if and when it can be persuaded to turn on at all.

I give thanks for a good novel to turn off my brain...and for when my neighbour turned the music down.

Barking

I give thanks for taking another opportunity to escape from my little life awhile. To Jan for her kindness and company, for the sharing of laughter and some less than funny feelings. 

I give thanks for the chance to experience the spa experience together, and for agreeing though interesting and enjoyable up to a point, it wasn't something we'd want to make a point of doing often or for much longer. In fact if we'd stayed there much later today I think we'd both have gone quite mad - but in a different way from out usual sort!

I give thanks for trying to find a footpath I was sure I'd seen on a map sometime, unsuccessfully, but enjoying a stroll instead along an old sunken lane with twisted tree roots and lush ferns on the banks way above our heads. For this pretty fallen bark on pretty leaves just lying posing in the grounds waiting to be photographed. 

I give thanks for the gorgeous late afternoon sky of dappled clouds and slanting sun over the late summer rural landscape. For the feeling of homecoming on any journey that ends with the train sweep into our beautiful bay. For my enduring ability to find bright minutiae to appreciate and share within times of shadow and sorrow.

Perfect timing

I give thanks for a pre-booked something completely different to do with one of the long days of too much time to think this week. For Jan agreeing to book with me...

For our trains being randomly due to arrive at the same station at the same time...and for hers being late enough for me to fit in a sudden urgent need to visit a loo. For remembering what I'd forgotten to pack (my radar key) and finding out just how improvisational I can be in an ordinary loo if must be...

I give thanks for another new experience in this designated year of 'living differently'...I am now at a spa! I give thanks to Rachel finding and road testing the offer...and that we are about to taste test the dinner having worked up an appetite with walks in the grounds and swims.

One door opens

Sometimes the hardest part of the hard stuff in my life is never having anyone to say 'Shucks, that sucks...what can I do to make it feel better?' So, I give thanks that yesterday was one of the Mondays when Rachel comes to try and make stuff feel better anyway. I give thanks for being brought pizza from Waitrose and home grown salad things, for help fighting with the cooker door which is not at all keen on staying shut these days and which encouraged us to produce an apposite commentary with phrases like  'not much of a catch' and 'closure issues'...

I give thanks for turning the TV on briefly, randomly in time to see Tom Daley and partner being very clever, very patient and very pleased...

I give thanks today has produced a varied array of situational malfunction and irritation to save me focussing on any specific cosmic injustice. For having developed the habit of seeking the fineness of details when the bigger picture just seems smudged and wrong

For the scent of petunias greeting me some feet before reaching a hanging basket outside a roadside house. For Luders redesigning their broccoli and stilton pasties so there's less pasty and more broccoli and stilton. For an afternoon nap...sometimes the best way to deal with this world is to absent yourself from it I find...besides, a little rest gives me strength to fight with the cooker door again. 

Dark matters

I give thanks for the cool freshness of the breeze when I opened my curtains and window wider in the early morning; for the comfort of warm water in my bath...

For Co-op Fair Trade Assam and Earl Grey tea in copious amounts; for making pancakes when I didn't feel like eating because you can eat pancakes almost without realising you did.

For a strange vivid image in a dream of riding in a bus beside a body of water and thinking I saw the black back of a fin whale break the surface, and then it breaking again and being more knobbly, and wondering if it were some sort of large reptile or fish...until it came gradually right out of the water up a ramp to the night sky that appeared...revealing itself to be a very ornate goth punk hearse!

For practising my best philosophicalness, practising being considerate and kind in thought and deed, including to myself...especially to myself... and getting through another world weary, dreary, rather teary and dearie me sort of day dealing with dark matters not best suited to producing a gratitude blog. Sometimes I do wonder if I'm best suited to producing a gratitude blog at all...but then I remember it's one thing I do that matters.

Brown and sticky

I give thanks for an early night and a long sleep between clean sheets. For waking up refreshed and ready to assume the duck position for life's next swipe of the big stick. Sometimes it knocks me when I'm down; sometimes when I'm up, and knocks me down...so I'm grateful for being somewhere in between this time and as prepared as you can ever be. If you're really prepared it's not a knock is it? It's simply playing cricket...

I give thanks for the neighbours being out so I could process the experience in the way I do best, including talking out loud to myself to hear the things I need to hear. I give thanks for a tricky sewing job requiring dry eyes and non dripping nose, plus dirty floors requiring vacuuming so a little light howling and domestic violence could also ensue. I give thanks for tackling, almost successfully, the removal of seagull poo from a prominent window pane...appreciating the cosmic appropriateness of the challenge, and the fact I failed to complete it. 

I give thanks for the warmth of the sun's embrace and for the sparkle of the sea smiling at me from the seat with the clearest view... I give thanks for cobbling together a gratitude blog post on a day when it's not been my foremost emotion.

Rules of the game

Mmm...nice tea! Copious thanks were given to David for a menu of so many favourite things provided by lucky guesses... You can tell they were guesses because one of them was beetroot juice and that would have been up there with the least favourite things if I'd ever imagined such a horror existed. I give thanks for volunteering to try some...and declaring it not quite as bad as it might have been. Oh, and for understanding why I don't get invited to dinner very often of course!

Today I gave thanks for a rare juxtaposition of good energy levels, pain free joints and warm sunny weather. I had a real yen to go for a Walk, but such is the case in the middle of the summer when the nicest places are too far away and would be too crowded, or inaccessible without a car, even the lower case variety's a bit of a conundrum. I gave thanks for setting to with domestic chores, and sewing projects, and a little light ebay therapy until I could resist no more and went for a brisk toddle down here. Locals will know where, and locals who know where I live and how feeble one can feel will know it's a good enough toddle from my flat door and back to feel a small w walk has been done.

I give thanks for the textile recycling bin having room for the textiles I'd taken to put in it, for the tide being out so there weren't too many people on the wall or packed on the sand below it. For listening to children making, remaking and negotiating the rules of a game they were playing climbing on the other side of the sign I sat with my back against to eat my lunch. For the line of confetti sails on the horizon as some far away race took place.

I give thanks for all audible neighbours being out for a while so I could lounge on the sofa with ice cream and the Outlaws without feeling aurally intruded upon. That gelato scoops straight from the freezer. For leeks and mushrooms in cream cheese and pesto sauce cooking for my dinner - another of my favourite flavours, but I already knew that so not so much of a surprise...Oh and a lemon tart for dessert I was given to bring home yesterday as there wasn't time or room. Double gratitude for the double provision of that...

Birds of a weather

I give thanks my joints have been gentler the last couple of days...particularly today, as instead of contemplating the wonders of the universe I had to get out and interact with it. For non blood test related chat with Sylvana while she took some, and meeting and being able to assist Linda on a shopping quest. For the sculpture trail which I've not given my full attention to yet looking as if it will be well worthy of some some time this summer.

I give thanks the man who tripped and fell on me in the veg shop didn't cause any damage, even to the eggs I was clutching at the time...and the man who tripped and almost fell on me on the pavement later didn't because twice in one day would be unnecessarily odd. 

I give thanks for warm sunshine in the gaps in the clouds, and for the gathering greyness showering a few little sprinkles here and there between.

I give thanks I've been invited to have tea at someone else's tonight...and that as it's somewhere else I've been offered a lift home afterwards as well.

Somewhere under the sunbow

I give thanks for a very pleasant day. I'm not sure how much of the pleasantness was in my head rather than outside it - but does it matter? I give thanks I had nothing urgent or serious to do, because savouring doing things slowly has been very much the flavour of it...oh, and the flavours! I give thanks for savouring those as well...

There was warm sunshine, of that I'm sure, as I saw other people exposing parts of their skin to it... and I gave thanks for exposing some parts of mine as well... I give thanks for turning my face up for a kiss of it and seeing the faintest hint of a halo round the sun...and that my camera saw it too!

I give thanks for their being lots of awaited post awaiting me at the post office, including a letter inviting me for a pre op assessment at last. For getting it together to make a couple of phone calls querying things in the letter, at least partly coherently (I think), talk to a couple of people on line who know me better than to expect too much in that department, operate a machine safely that washes things, and one that I watch things on. 

I give thanks for doing a lot of smiling for no easily discernible reason...and for not feeling the need to come up with one either. I give thanks it's been so quiet here...outside my head!

Sound

I give thanks for the sound of the wind and the smell of the rain. For top deck bus rides where the trees come up to the windows to say hello, and you look down on the marbled light and shade of the sea.

I give thanks for a non acupuncture related meet up with Rachel. For avoiding the worst of the main road clog ups and a quick scenic detour down pretty lanes for a glimpse of the river's curve below. For a visit to a rather random wellbeing centre/coach house cafe/shabby chic wedding venue where a ukelele group were gently strumming and singing I Believe in Angels while we visited the glitter heart mirrored bathroom before being tucked under colourful blankets, gazing up at stuccoed ceiling and chandelier before closing our eyes.

I give thanks for the bus home eventually arriving, and missing the worst of a squally shower when I got off at this end. For a noisy nearby neighbour going out for a while not long after I made enough noise over hers for her to know I was home...and for enjoying letting my ears and other body parts go back to the bit they enjoyed between the two preceding paragraphs...

I had a gong bath...and though words don't fail me they fail to do it justice. Absolutely one of the most literally awesome and amazing, deep, delightful and wonder full experiences I have ever had in my entire life... A lot of thanks was and still is being given...

The rest of the day

I give thanks for my perseverance the last few days, persisting with doing the things on my to do lists. For body parts I usually pat and say 'There there, dear, you just have a little rest' being pressed into grumbling, fumbling, but ultimately successful action.

I give thanks for years of creative thinking and penny pinching, and thinking outside of not the kind of box that usually goes with the phrase; for the people that helped me, and the people who seemed to hinder me and thus made me try even harder.

I give thanks for years of not having a proper one not hindering my home making skills a bit...and for my property appraisal revealing I had appraised the situation correctly and have pinched and pressed pretty well.

I give thanks for dancing round the flat for a couple of minutes of exuberant relief and joy before the aforementioned bits and pieces threatened to go on strike and I did the kind and sensible thing and settled down for a read and a knit and a snooze.

Tie and dry

I give thanks for the delicate shapes and colours in the sunset sky last night...

For going out in the rain today... For coming home to shelter and warmth afterwards. And clean...and tidy...and (for a little while) quiet! I love clean and tidy and quiet, I soak in it like a fantastic fragrant pool of warmth for the soul...

For the Hospice shop happily taking my unwanted electricals...for a cab driver I've not seen for while coming to carry me and this weighty pile down to town so we could have a catch up chat on the way. 

For a very jolly knitting session...tears of laughter at times! For Cathy kindly bringing me some unwanted sewing patterns she'd brought before and I'd not been there to receive. 

For Linda bringing out a pretty dress I thought she'd brought to mend or alter. 'It's so you,' Carol said looking at me, 'Don't you mean it's so Linda?' I said...but she didn't. Linda had brought the dress before as well...and it was for me too! I was so touched. I've struggled to get the colours to come out right in this photo, but I give thanks I'm sure if there's any adjusting of fit needing doing I'll be the right woman for the job!