Hey good lookin'

Oof! I could have done with a rest day today so I give thanks having to prepare for some pleasant non-medical outings coming up was the reason for not flopping about as much as I might have preferred to.

I give thanks for putting together some picnic nibbles for tomorrow when, all being well, Laura's taking me for a bit of a day out. To say I was cooking would be pushing it a bit, but I made some feta pastries from ready rolled pastry and chopped up pepper etc, heated up some part baked fruit bread and falafels, and opened a tin of stuffed vine leaves... I give thanks for 'alternative' convenience food and for the convenience of only being averagely clumsy!

These tasks had had to be fitted into afternoon as tonight (if I can stay awake to get the bus... and get off it!) I'm going for a gong bath, and methinks I'll not want to get up any earlier than I have to in the morning, I give thanks for making some granola for tomorrow's breakfast though so I will want to get up in time for that...

I give thanks though I'm very tired, and everything seems to be taking far too much time and effort, I've not been in a lot of pain today

All around the world

With apologies to the planet for the air miles, I give thanks for a very tasty (con)fusion tea - cooking some rather mangey old cauliflower, carrots and potatoes with onion and peas in Thai green curry sauce, adding crunchy peanut butter to the mix and rice and quinoa on the side.

For enjoying this while catching up with an astonishingly dramatic and emotionally demanding tennis match from earlier in the day. One of the best I (and all the commentators) have ever seen. For then catching an old Midsomer Murders I'd never come across before and, in instalments, managing two whole rows of knitting before my hands began to seize up!

For making it through a night of mean dreams, pain, discomfort and distress. All the literature suggests one should talk to family and friends about difficult feelings, but not everyone has those sort of relationships and I give thanks at least I know I don't, and don't overshare with people who'd rather I didn't.

I give humongous thanks for my knee being better, and all my other aches and pains being under control, so I was able to actually enjoy going about my business for the first time in a couple of weeks. For my lovely neighbours, including whoever it was who left a bouquet by the bins where the chap's body was, with a note saying 'I don't know who you were but you didn't deserve to die like this'. For the staff in the opticians, doctor's, pharmacy, shops and cafés for making my sad mood dissipate a little...and for the brilliant busker on the Triangle singing love songs and bringing it back, but in a good way...with a takeaway tea and a spot of Viennese pâtisserie... For Nick the cab driver being back on the rank so there was a nice ride home, and for the consultant calling me 'delightful' in her report. I've seen this before in my medical notes, and suspect it's code for 'won't stop talking' (or worse) but it's still pleasant to hear you're pleasant even if you're not sure it's true.

I give thanks for all the people enjoying planning or going on holidays. I ran into one of the few folk I know who isn't on one...and she proceeded to talk about travel. I give thanks I had a legitimate excuse to get away... even if 'getting away' is impossible. Oh and I give thanks I've come up with a response for the next time someone suggests I've had 'enough' trips already. I shall ask 'Have you had enough drinks?'

Ironic

I give thanks for all the opportunities to learn from life's lessons that come my way...but goodness me sometimes I wish it could be half term!

I give thanks for a much needed acupuncture treatment, and for Rachel moving the bookcase a centimetre or two so the door would close beside it, which I hadn't noticed needed doing until it was too late. For pasta salad for tea with leftovers for lunch and the washing up done so a quiet day in the kitchen (except for the spin cycle of course!). For getting up and sorted in time for the surveyor, who was a very pleasant chap...and then giving in to the need for a snooze on the sofa. It's taken ten years of getting older and iller to learn to relax about needing extra rest, but now that form has left me re-assessing myself as a useless lazy scrounger which is sad as though thinking positively might just help with health conditions, thinking negatively tends to have the opposite effect. Oh well, I guess I should be grateful for dialysis round the corner because then the government will be allow me to be tired...

I give thanks for a pretty little necklace put together by request to Jan from a bit of bobbly chain and a magnetic clasp. I'm not putting on weight so maybe it's all the emptying buckets building up muscle in my neck and shoulders but most of my others seem too tight at the moment and will have to be made longer... I give thanks I know I don't need necklaces but life is a bit short on frivolity just now and it cost even less than I thought it might - ie nothing at all! Thank you Jan!

For catching up with last 24 hrs In Police Custody which was about a fatal stabbing of a young man in a residential street. I always find these real life investigations interesting but particularly this scenario in view of recent circumstances round here. For my hands being free from pain and other tasks long enough to manage a few minutes sewing my sun/moon hanging...

I've been craving Mediterranean scenery lately...but I still give thanks for the green green grass (and trees) of home...

Oranges and lemons

Well, it was a strirry stirry night on the terrace, with speculation and hypothesis rife. I give thanks for the opportunity to overhear human natures revealing themselves in the doorstep gossip and chat, though today with the tent still up and the bushes still being searched I wished I could overhear more of how the investigation is progressing instead of someone's strimmer buzzing away! We have been door to doored, and I give thanks for having no information...and knowing I have no information...

I give thanks for a bag of rather sleazy looking implements, that are in fact ice lolly moulds ready to make renally friendly chilled treats when summer comes back again. In the meantime I give thanks for mandarin oranges in lemon vegan jelly...with very non-vegan cream!

My knee is still being seriously unkind so I give thanks a trip out with Laura was postponed, and for the sun going in and out and not feeling I was missing its warmth. I give thanks for having a bit of a tidy up and clean ready for the prospective buyers mortgage company survey tomorrow.

I give thanks I think Rachel is due in a while to treat my many and various infirmities...and that I also think it's her turn to cook tea. I could be wrong of course...but it's nice to think it's true...

Every breath you take

I give thanks for the pain being generally gentler today...except for one of my knees which didn't get the memo and, despite being strapped up with an Actipatch, is causing a lot of bad language when ever it's moved. I see what the trainers do to injured joints on the tennis courts with envy...and give thanks for elastic tubular bandaging...

I give thanks it stopped me gawping out the kitchen window too long at both activities and hiatus following the finding of a deceased person in the road down the terrace from me. I'm always fascinated by investigative procedures and found myself wishing the neighbour clearing out his cellar wasn't making quite so much noise so I could hear more of what the officers were saying. I also give thanks for the opportunity to ponder on how 'somebody' becomes 'a body' - such a different concept and only a breath apart.

I give thanks for the relief of the rest of me being just averagely achy so I could rest and recuperate. I might not move much when I'm sore but somehow even that takes a lot of effort... I give thanks for doing something vaguely like cooking for the first time in days...

I give thanks for a day off office work, not even trying to find words to try to explain to the DWP the difference between surviving and skiving. For not needing to go down or up the stairs, though the sunshine was inviting that would just be inviting more pain. For the Red Arrows going to the airshow unusually slowly so I had time to get to a different window, and choosing a flight path that meant I could watch them a while.

I give thanks for the Police. No, the blond ones of the 70s and 80s (sigh!)...

Everyone's gone to the moon

I give thanks I didn't go to the party. I mean I rarely fit in anywhere but these people were dressed as fruit and veg (plus a chef)! It was lovely to see them though, out in the garden posing for photos...It cheered me up on a difficult evening with pain, fretting over the work capability assessment form and what my latest blood tests will show. Just one of those is bad enough - all three at once is tricksy, I can tell you! The only way I deal with all that's wrong with me is not to think about it, thinking about it makes it feel much worse...

I give thanks for phone games and a book to see me through achy parts of the night.

I give thanks for another  book from Ann, and my morning sideways skim of the paper front pages. It's not the so-called news that fascinates but the way it's presented - the language and layout choices, the black and white 'them and us' attitudes... But most especially the non-headline front page stories. I'm sure there's a technical term for these lifestyle lures - buy me and be the kind of person who needs to know what a famous person said, or see pictures of more stuff you might like to buy, dishes you'd like to recreate to feel that you can cook, places you might like to stay and pretend to be someone else for a while... Gee sometimes I'm grateful I'm only nominally part of the human race, it all looks so complicated!

I give thanks for getting out to do my bits in town, and for not falling asleep in Mimas deserted courtyard when I stopped to have a rest... For meeting a few people to pass the time of day with, as they say, including a cab driver I've not seen for a while... For Mr Tesco making some me some food again when I arrived home exhausted...and it actually being rather nice! Ready meals are damn useful when I'm tired and sore, but rarely something I'd otherwise choose...

I give thanks for Facebook posts, the sounds of wedding bells and aircraft going to and from the show reminding me of people enjoying their day. For watching tennis matches and thinking that sums it up - same event viewed so differently from different sides of the net.

I can see clearly now

So, the day after a hospital appointment is a day spent waiting to hear if I have to turn round and go back more immediately! I give thanks for waiting today because sitting about not doing much is just about all I'm fit for... For making a tentative start on the work capability assessment form. I can see it's going to be a lot of work just filling it in - I had to have a rest half way through typing out my list of medications!

I give thanks for my new window unit. The sea has more or less disappeared behind vegetation, but even greenery looks better through clear glass not condensation. Such a pleasant man came to fit it too...

I give thanks for tennis from Roland Garros to keep half an eye on. I can't watch too much at once as I can't see clearly through one of the lenses of my specs, so I give thanks for pause and rewind and fast forward...and an eye test appointment booked next week.

I give thanks my monthly electricity direct debit has been considerably reduced. That was an unusual and welcome surprise! For discovering the reason I can't put credit on my phone is that Visa is down, though mildly irritated it cost me a long phone call to find out, I'd rather that than something personally wrong with my credit.

I give thanks for the most of the neighbours being out today so I could find out my sofa is just the right size for a nap. For listening to some other ones getting ready for a party. For being advised about the possibility of noise and invited down for a drink. I give thanks for knowing this is merely politeness...and it would be polite to stay at home.