Doubly fortunate

Bedlam still reigns at Morrisons, our usual supermarket. We did manage, though, to get more or less all we needed. I had to hazard passing a bored kid swinging her basket from side to side, more or less covering the whole width of the aisle. Her parents were totally oblivious of the situation. Roll on next week. By then the children should be back at school, many of the adults back at work, at the times we shop. I’m longing to get back to normality.

Afterwards we popped down to the village pub. We met up with some acquaintances who’d spent Christmas in a self-catering cottage in Boot, in Cumbria. They’d had a wonderful time. We reminisced about some of our visits there.

We were also joined by our alcoholic friend & her partner. She was in a bit of a state as her father had died at the weekend. It was quite a shock for her as he’d died from leukaemia. She hadn’t even been told he had the problem - or maybe she just hadn’t taken it in. She apparently doesn’t get on well with her stepmother – know the feeling.

We’re feeling pretty lucky ourselves. So far we’ve heard of two deaths over the festive period. Even the man who came to fix our boiler had had to go to A&E on Boxing Day with severe chest pains – pneumonia. Hopefully he’ll be feeling a lot brighter by Friday when he returns with the parts to make a more permanent repair. As for the state of our alcoholic friend she was so upset upon hearing of her father’s death, she went to the pub for alcohol & drank sufficient to slide off the seat onto the floor & had to be carried home.

More cheery conversation began as the friends & acquaintances talked about the “joy” of life in the village centre. Heysham is an old, quite picturesque village, many of the houses dating from the 17^th century. It seems there are hazards of living right in the old centre. One recounted leaving her front door open on a hot day to return to find strangers in her front room. They’d just come in to look around the “museum”. They were politely shown out with the news it wasn’t a museum it was someone’s private home! As for the other pair, they had had their door knocked on to be asked for two ice-creams for the children. There is a stall next to the house selling ice-creams, drinks & snacks which was closed, so the people assumed our acquaintances were just late opening up so they went to the house. The fact is the stall has nothing to do with them. They’ve even had people asking to be let in for teas & coffees. We’re suddenly glad we live out of the centre, in the more modern part of town. We may feel a bit remote from village life but there are definite compensations.

There's just one more thing to say

 HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU ALL

From freezing to sweltering

After freezing yesterday, today I’m preparing to be sweltered.

The man came to sort out the boiler yesterday afternoon. He’s made a temporary repair which means we now have heating. However, the thermostat doesn’t work. The only way we can control the heating is literally to switch off the boiler from time to time, or to adjust the timer to come on & off more often. Still, I think that is preferable to being as cold as we were yesterday.

As a result we didn’t get the food shop done. That delight awaits us today. I just hope we don’t find the bedlam of the Monday before Christmas when we get there. If necessary we’ll just get the essentials i.e. some spuds & onions, & abandon the shop. We’ll just have to continue using up stuff from the freezer in that case.

One thing that we did achieve during our wait yesterday was solve part of our holiday plans for 2015. We’ve managed to find a very comfortable looking converted barn in Burgundy. It looks as though we’ll see Beaune yet.

Now we just have to organise some transport. After our successful train trip to Tours & Paris, we’re thinking of going by train again. We’re also thinking of extending our one week now booked self-catering holiday with a one week hotel stay, possibly in Beaune or Dijon, maybe even another couple of days in Paris, or a mixture of them all. I’ll get on to that come the weekend. It’s already sounding exciting to us.

Survived

We’ve survived. Christmas is over. Now we only have the New Year to face.

Christmas was a short day for me. It started & ended with All the Christmases” on Radio4 starting at 8am & 9pm.I left the programme midway in the morning. I was somewhat surprised to find when I went to bed & put the bedside radio on, that I rejoined the same programme only slightly overlapping with where I’d left it in the morning.

On Boxing Day we went over to the golf club, where we were told the news of the death of our friend with a brain tumour had reached the golf club on Christmas Day. Needless to say the news had a dampening effect on those who were dining there.

Saturday saw us off to the local shops for fresh bread. On the way back we looked across the Bay. It was fabulous, so still & an icy blue.

So now we come to today. We’re hoping to go food shopping later on. However, the central heating seems to be on strike. I suspect that it has frozen up. The world outside is certainly very white with frost. Even now the thermometer on the shed wall says -10C. The temperature inside the house seems to be slowly going down. I’m consoling myself with the thought that we do at least have a gas fire in the lounge so we can always use that to keep us warm if necessary.