My Everchanging Plot of Life

But I say that very, very cautiously.

There’s going to be more chaos, but it may be of the more self induced variety.

Anyway, what’s been going on to keep me from blogging much lately?

• One good friend diagnosed with ovarian cancer…
• One parent with newly diagnosed diabetes
• Complicated journeys to and from aforementioned parent currently still in hospital, (and one with limited visiting owing to nasty bug doing the rounds,) until new routines and skills have been learned (This has taken up a huge amount of time this week)
• One steep learning curve with mobile phone technology (It’s useful in these circumstances to have teenaged nieces and nephews.)
• Relearning my way around the town of my own teenage years
• A series of one-off events that aren’t onerous in themselves, but were all undertaken at a time when this week looked as if it was going to be quite a gentle, quiet one

Right now though, despite an afternoon nap, I’m completely exhausted and going to bed. Sleep well.

if I'm absent for a bit, circumstances are conspiring against me, and I'm needing to learn to tri-locate.

My computer wishes me to inform you all it's feeling sorely neglected.

My new piece of technology is very scary still.

My bed wishes I was keeping it company more as it's very lonely.

My brain is befuddled and bemused as to the various routes from A to B and why they have to go via H and C and N, and the appalling costs of the simplest, and fastest, but ridiculously indirect route.

See you some time.

I have had to succumb to that scourge of modern life.

A mobile phone.

Shudders deeply, and looks suspiciously at it, as it sits in smug splendour on my desk.

Now, it has to be said, current circumstances really warrant it. I do actually need to be very easily contactable for the foreseeable future, and I’m often out and away a lot. It also means I won’t be tying up the house phone.

But, why, oh, why did the spare phone my sister is so kindly lending to me have to be such a girly pink?

Now, which is worse, the flack I will get for having to eat my words about me possessing a mobile phone, the stress of learning to text (I am informed this is her chosen method of communication, and I’ll just have to learn), or having yet another pink item in my possession.

Woe, woe, woe, woe, woe.

Blimey - it's been an action packed few days.

I'm completely, and utterly exhausted, and devoid of the words to describe much of it.

Change is in the offing... we wait and see.

of all volunteers, I now declare I have completed all tasks, bar one, that I was needing help with.

What do you reckon? If I give up now and go to bed and don't finish the other tasks that emerged until the morning, will the phone finally ring?

I'm not going to stay awake much longer, anyway

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

• To come and tidy my room,
• pack my stuff for the next three days,
• teach my session on Prayer when Life is Tough,
• talk to friend who is phoning back this evening... (He's opted out of my life for the last year, then expects to waltz back into it as if the last three years hadn't happened!!! Then was narked because I couldn't talk when he did ring at 8.12 this morning. OK - so there's an 8 hour time difference, that's not the point!)

• Cook me some delicious food,
• persuade my printer to last just three weeks more?

No?? Sighs. Suppose I'd better just go and get on with it all then. I can at least report back to He Who is Entitled to lecture me that I did ask for help when I needed it, and not just battled womanfully on.

I am very tired. It is about 90% self inflicted, (see previous post) so there’s no need for sympathy.

However, in between various commitments of the paid work variety, and sitting up until All Hours writing my 100 facts, I’ve also had two men in my bedroom. One of them is coming back, we’ve made a date. T’other’s sending someone else. Several someone elses!

Still, it does mean the tap in the hand basin in my room will work, as I can’t shift the wretched whatever to change the washer, the other 20 or so taps will be getting checked, and the double glazing condensation will be sorted. And we’re getting more loft insulation. There’s luxury.

Finally, we seem to be sorted with the utility bills…

Off to see my favouritest home communion lady!! Not quite sure who’s the silliest, her or me, but we do enjoy ourselves.

that was two and a half hours ago...

I got absorbed by this instead... I blame that very nice Mr LandersUK.

100 facts 1.       I enjoy practicing scales and exercises on all three of my main musical instruments. 2.       I have only ever had one proper job interview in my life. I got the job. 3.       I support Scotland in all sporting events. 4.       I collect hymn books, and use them all. 37 at the last count. 5.       I have never worn make up. 6.       I have never coloured my hair. 7.       I am incapable of maintaining tidiness in my own space for more than a week. 8.       I have moved house 22 times since leaving home for university. 9.       I know how many days old I am. 10.   I have an allergy to alcohol. 11.   I am remarkably bossy, but try not to be. 12.   I was very surprised to discover there was someone else with my name (First name and Surname) – but relieved to discover she spelt both differently. One in 42 years isn’t bad… 13.   I hate being without my glasses, and feel very unsafe. 14.   I hate being touched unexpectedly, and especially on the back near my neck, by someone I don’t like. 15.   I’m not good at pretending to like someone I don’t like. 16.   I could never, ever do a cartwheel. 17.   I can’t run, swim or walk fast at all, but can do long distances in all three quite contentedly if left to my own devices. 18.   I would like to live somewhere for longer than three years at a stretch. 19.   I’m incredibly lazy, but very skilled at pretending not to be. 20.   I once sat on an Underground Train on the Circle Line for two and a half hours, rather than go home. 21.   I never wear a watch. 22.   I know all the current permitted two letter words in Scrabble. 23.   I have more copies of the King James Version of the Bible than is reasonable for someone who never uses that version, but keep them all because of their family history. 24.   As a vegetarian, the only meat I ever crave or miss is corned beef. Stovies just are not the same with it. 25.   I can’t stand tea. 26.   I’ve had more new patient checks than any other kind of medical appointment. 27.   I hate early mornings. 28.   Too much sugar and caffeine, combined, gives me serious joint ache. 29.   I have more godchildren than nieces and nephews. 30.   I passed my driving test first time. 31.   I took my driving theory test in the first week of it’s inception. 32.   I am extremely stubborn 33.   I never wanted children. 34.   I used to have to write book reports on every book I read at junior school to prove I was reading as fast as I said I was. 35.   I really, really, really, can’t bear mice and panic about being caught in a room with one loose. We won’t mention rats. 36.   I have an undeserved reputation for hating cats and dogs. 37.   I have a well deserved reputation for disliking all rodent type animals. (See 35) though I can cope if their owners are there, too. 38.   I want an HGV licence. 39.   I love reading obituaries. 40.   My funeral is planned. I won’t get what I want, but I enjoyed deciding it and will enjoy the thought of the various comments that will be uttered on reading the instructions! 41.   I will never ride a motorcycle. 42.   I have a poor sense of rhythm for a musician. 43.   I want to be a great-aunt. But not yet. 44.   I’ve given up giving up chocolate for Lent. 45.   I’ve given up trying to stop biting my nails. I only do so in my sleep if my subconscious thinks they’re too long. 46.   I used to be convinced all adults went to bed at midnight and lived to be 100. 47.   I have a terrible habit of fence-sitting. 48.   Reverse psychology can work well on me… nothing like telling me I can’t do something... 49.   I used to come home in my lunch hour from Sixth form to do housework. 50.   I have never been on a date. 51.   I can have the most spectacular temper tantrums, on rare occasions, but no-one ever sees them 52.   I have only graduated to a CD player in the last two years. 53.   I’m mostly very introverted, but most people do not believe me. 54.   I have very eclectic reading tastes. 55.   I’m too wimpish to watch any film with an 18 certificate. 56.   I’m nearly too wimpish for any film with a 15 certificate. 57.   I once bought a bat (of the small animal variety) home in the cool bag. I didn’t know it was there until it peered up at me from it’s perch on the Marmite jar. It had been there at least 12 hours, and travelled 100 miles. I was told it was very cute. I begged leave to differ. 58.   My first grey hair appeared when I was 14. 59.   I once slept for 17 ½ hours in one go. I was very tired. I slept for most of the next four days as well. 60.   I can get obsessed with time “wasting” activities very easily. 61.   I voted Conservative once. We won’t dwell on that. I was 18… 62.   I passed all my final exams, but failed to get a degree. 63.   I have two stages of anger, one hot, tearful and incoherent and the other very cold, lucid and articulate. The latter is rare, but scary. 64.   I lived in New Zealand for a while. 65.   I didn’t have a teddy bear until I was 40. 66.   I can, but won’t (except in rare circumstances), knit. 67.   I think gardening is a waste of time, effort and money. 68.   I loathe over-cooked broccoli. 69.   I’m very good at telling myself I’m OK, when I’m patently not. 70.   I’m very bad at letting other people help me when I need it. 71.   I make a very good vegetarian lasagne. 72.   I love eating out. 73.   I am far less naïve than I’m often thought to be. 74.   I really miss several people who I thought were going to be part of my life for a long time, then things changed. 75.   I don’t get Lord of the Rings. At all. 76.   I would live in Scotland, if I could. But I can’t. 77.   I can live without chocolate, but no-one believes me. 78.   I am not eligible for jury service. 79.   I am not good in an environment where there’s one rule for one person and a different rule for everyone else. Unless I understand the reasoning. 80.   I no longer accept poor service in shops. I’ve worked in one!! 81.   If I wasn’t doing what I do now, I’d like to run a book shop or a sandwich shop with a better variety of vegetarian sandwiches. 82.   I would like to get a degree one day. 83.   I worry way too much. 84.   Very few people know my middle name. Or than I have one. 85.   Most people don’t know my surname. 86.   I would hate to teach me anything. 87.   Apparently, I do an excellent roast dinner. How would I know, I’m vegetarian! 88.   I have very erratic sleep patterns. 89.   My kneecaps are congenitally too small for my legs. 90.   I love number patterns and numerical palindromes. I will be watching my clock at 08.08.08 on 08.08.08 91.   On 8th August 1988 I caught a train at 8 in the morning and did an 8 hour journey. 92.   I persist in risking life and limb asking people to refrain from using mobile phones in Quiet Carriages of trains. Or turning music down… 93.   I refuse to move out of the way of cyclists on pavements. 94.   Did I mention stubborn? 95.   I have a shameful habit of hanging onto grudges long after the event. 96.   I’m bad at changing my mind about people. Very bad. 97.   I retain the most bizarre pieces of information. 98.   I try to maintain a reasonable length Christmas Card list, but fail completely. 99.   I rarely, if ever watch TV. (Possibly, partly, to do with numbers 55 and 56.) 100.            I wish I’d not let several opportunities go by me.

I’m recovering from yesterday’s experiences. I think my more positive frame of mind has taken a bit of a temporary setback, and I can only be deeply thankful I didn’t try this particular exercise when I was feeling well and truly out of sorts.

I’ve done all today’s work.

I refuse to do any more unnecessary housework just to keep me occupied. At least, until there’s a better division of the tasks involved….

My annual most hated event is at the end of the week.

I’m cold… and that’s with the heating on.

I’m about to pick up the full and overflowing recycling bag, the shopping list and go and do something more interesting instead.

There are times when I think I’m completely and utterly insane.

I was visiting a church of a tradition that is unfamiliar to me, as part of a course I’m teaching. I didn’t feel I could inflict such things on my lovely little group without being prepared to do so myself, that being the nature of the teaching style I’m employing.

I was, on the surface, very, very well behaved at church this morning. I joined in everything, I chipped in with the Bible Study in language that was being used by the group, even if I was inwardly squirming madly, I cheerfully sang along with everything I knew and made up hummed along harmonies for what I didn’t. It sounded good! I sat, instead of standing for the very long improvised intercessions. I even listened to the sermon, and kept up with the speed at which Bible references were announced.

However, after three hours (yes, you read that correctly) I’m certain I’m not supposed to come out of church with the strongest urge I’ve ever had to commit all the sins I can think of in the next twenty minutes.

In the absence of other opportunities presenting themselves, I stuck to going to the local shop on the way home and buying a large, large, bar of chocolate and have every intention of eating it all in one sitting.

Interestingly, the one thing I will remember most clearly from this morning is the very, very strong urge I had to sing out loud, (but I was doing it quietly inside instead.)

Drop Thy still dews of quietness,
Till all our strivings cease.
Take from our souls, the strain and stress,
And let our ordered lives confess,
The Beauty of Thy peace.

Sleeping in the afternoon… I’ve done it for three days running now, and it’s never good! I’d propped myself up with all the pillows I could find in the hopes I would stay awake if I was more upright as I read my book, and got thinking about much of complicatedness and off to sleep I went.

Today, I really was shattered, though. I’d begun a piece of writing, that turned out to be much more emotionally demanding than I thought it would be, and I ended up all a-wash. Which, is no bad thing, really… I’m never moderate in this crying caper. I can go for months and months and months and not cry at all, and then all of a sudden, that’s me done for. It’s messy, and not easily covered up….

So, I’m expecting a phone call any minute now from a friend who caught me at a seriously bad moment in the process this morning. She’s not someone I can prevaricate to easily, nor will she let me get away with “I’ll be OK.” (It happens the other way round, too.)

Oh well, I don’t suppose another good cry’ll do any harm.

Pah. Today is the day I normally have a lie-in, it being my Day Off Day. Getting out of bed much before 10 of the clock is unusual on a Day Off Day.

But, today, some nice kind friends are coming over to see me, catch up on life and the universe and, most importantly, take me out to lunch and all under the guise of an Educational Visit to a local place of interest to the friends’ 14 year old. Mind you, visiting me could be classed as educational and a place of much interest. However, on this occasion, it’s the kind of place 14 year olds with an interest in all things non-Earth based like.

“We’ll be bright and early.” I was informed.

So, here I am at 10.29 a.m. all clean, dressed, bag packed, money in purse, everywhere tidied and nowhere to go yet.

And have been so for the last hour and a half!!!

Sighs, I knew I should have got a definition of what “Bright and early” meant.

It’s taken a very nice man most of the afternoon, with much wandering in and out of bedrooms, but I think it’s solved the problem for now.

Other than that, it’s been a quiet, relaxing kind of day which was very pleasant after the exertions of yesterday evening and the interesting dream of last night. I wish I knew who it was I was sitting on the wall, in my best dress, (I don’t have a best dress!!) waiting for. I did get off the wall a few times to check out everyone there, but they either hadn’t seen me, or told me to keep waiting.

Even the difficult discussion went better than predicted.
It’s taken a long time to get to this point.

Bubbly bath, methinks.

Today, I’ve been doing money stuff and checking the bank statement. A monthly task, usually pretty easy, as I’m normally accurate at entering stuff into the accounts, and with the advent of various accounts packages it’s usually a ten minute job, at most, to reconcile the bank statement.

Today, I’ve been at it on and off all morning. Would it balance? No, it would not. 63p out every time. I re-did it twice, went away and washed the kitchen floor (normally an excellent source of inspiration) loaded the washing machine, came back and tried again and again.

Still 63p out.

Then a “Eureka!” moment. I remembered something a wise accountant had told me years ago, in the days when I was doing proper book-keeping in paper ledgers, with pencils to enter the data, abacuses and fingers and toes to do my adding up… OK, OK so I used a calculator that printed out… (sighs… I want the old days back).

Anyway, what I remembered was that if the digits in the figure I was out by added up to 9 or a multiple thereof, chances were I’d transposed some digits somewhere.

6+3=9…. Yes!!!! So, back I go for yet another go. I’d entered £5.18 as £5.81. There was my 63p. Changed it around, and lo! It balanced. Hooray.

I blame all the music transposing I’m doing at the moment… Up a tone or down a semitone, I’m hardly doing any straight-forwards music reading, no wonder my sums were suffering similarly.

It was like when I was learning to drive, and learning to play the organ at the same time!! I kept wanting to play the car pedals the same way as organ pedals. I decided, in conjunction with my beleaguered driving instructor who was suffering, to delay the driving until I’d learned to play the organ a bit better; at the time it was the far more useful skill. (I got paid for it!)

I was noble this morning. I’m not inclined to group discussion activities, but ‘tis the season for them. So, as an act of penance and reparation for my sin of earlier in the day, I toddled along to the church’s Lent group this morning. As if supporting Scotland through this Six Nations series is not penance enough for one Lenten season.

I brought down the average age range considerably. I nearly managed to behave beautifully, but failed somewhat.

I then had to have an afternoon nap to recover. So, I still didn’t do what I planned to do today. I can do it tomorrow instead.

If, of course, I don’t get distracted again. I haven’t bought home any more Clarinet in A parts to transpose this week.

Deep breaths, think calming thoughts, chill… relax…

Nah. Not working.

It’s very exhausting living with someone who is in their mid-fifties, but who acts more like a stroppy, geeky teenager who cannot cope with anything other than the “right” way to do things. (Um, usually not the way I do things!)

It’s exhausting ricocheting from being treated like an incompetent child one minute, to having to be the adult who sorts all the difficult things out the next. Never as an equal.

It’s worse than living with my mother ever was. I vowed I’d never, ever do that again once I got past 18.

It’s even worse when you begin to realise all the qualms and doubts you had about all of this in the first place were completely justified.

It’s very scary when you begin to realise you’ve got what you wanted, but it’s no longer the right thing for you to be doing.

It’s bizarre when you know you’re doing all the supposedly right things, (it looks very impressive written down, I’ve been quite bemused, really) but it’s actually all wrong!! And you’ve been knowing it for ages.

But….. it’s great when you realise you know you can do something about it all!! Just got to re-start a conversation I began 10 days ago, and bottled out of, big time, because I was way too scared at where it was taking me.

I’m beginning to get really annoyed by e-mails that arrive with the statement “Please consider the environment before printing this e-mail” added to them. I’m quite capable of judging for myself if I need to print out an e-mail or not… I’ve been careful about my paper usage for a lot longer than the current trends.

However, if someone would like to come and have a word with my environmentally unfriendly printer, I’d be grateful. I may be at throwing it out of the window stage which would be unkind after it’s given me at least seven years of relatively faithful service. Why it needed to make such a mess of printing out my seven carefully organised and ordered booklets, I have No Idea. But I have waste