On being 64

Oh Lord - another birthday been and gone and I am now 64, but it's not all bad news.

Photo by Peter Facey

I am slimmer and generally fitter than I have been for quite a few years. My diet is under control with stable low sugar levels (well mostly) and I am still losing weight. I am looking forward to having a brand new, probably German, knee joint soon. I am booked in for surgery on Valentine's Day of all days. I will be first on the list so have to be AT the hospital by 6.45am :(  I am usually dead to the world at that time, and having to get up an hour earlier in order to be ready is something I prefer not to think about right now.
But I am looking forward to getting it all done and getting on the road to recovery so I can be pretty mobile by the summer folk festivals. I will be a good girl and do everything according to the advice from the hospital. I will not rush things too fast but I will do the exercises and get as mobile as I can as quickly as I reasonably can.

As I don't drink alcohol, I am usually taxi driver for my friends and me. After the op. I will not be allowed to drive for 6 weeks! So it will be pay-back time and I'll be needing lifts off friends and family. I could actually be using public transport locally too! A total shock to the system! :D

As Honey is so good on the lead and does not pull at all I should be able to walk down the road with her after about a week or so, me on crutches or with sticks. I will need the exercise and it will stop Honey getting stir crazy if Jen is not able to take her out every day. Honey is so used to going in the back of my estate car, she will not get into the seat bit. I may have to insure Jen to drive my car to take Honey down to the park.
Once the 6 weeks of no-driving is over and I get the all clear to drive again I will have no problems, it's just coping with those first few weeks. I am sure they will go quickly. Jen works near a big Tesco, so I will be texting her with a shopping list for odd bits. Big shops can be done together or else I'll do it online and get it delivered when Jen is home. We'll survive!
So many people I know have had new knees and enjoy the freedom they have now. I am looking forward to being realtively free of the pain (eventually) and being able to walk without a stick and enjoy it again.The other knee will probably need doing too at some point, but maybe it can wait a bit longer once the right knee has been done.

I can now start thinking about a holiday and summer trips to enjoy later :) woohoo!

The future is bright! :D

Out with the old

The last day of 2012 and  a quick look back at personal memories. Sorry! I'll try to keep it brief :)
Last January I joined Slimming World along with my friend Linda and started off enthusiastically, losing my first half stone fairly quickly. It slowed down dramatically after that but I am within 2 pounds of losing 2 stone now. I have come down 3 dress sizes and starting to wear clothes in the next size down from that too!
My health generally has been ok apart from knee trouble and I am now 'on the list' for a new knee! Yippee!
The old diabetes seems under control - as long as I stay away from chocolate and cakes! The most recent check up was good - all the test results were 'normal' and I got a verbal 'gold star' from my doc. I just have to lose more weight and watch the sugar levels.

I have managed to get away a few times this year - first having a week on the Isle of Wight with Linda and our 2 dogs. We rented a 'cottage' on a farm smack bang in the centre of the island. The weather was very mixed but we did have some sunshine between showers. The dogs loved it and behaved very well.

The summer was, of course, London 2012 and the Olympics and Paralympics! Having been totally apathetic before hand, I swiftly got caught up in the excitment and thoroughly enjoyed all the events I watched. Well done Team GB! Didn't London look great as a back drop too!
I also got away for a few days in August - twice!. Cropredy was mid-August and the best one weatherwise so far for me. Look! Sun hat and sun burn! Ouch! And I got off lightly! Lobster was a popular colour this year!

Then it was Shrewsbury! Another longer weekend away and a lot more folk music.  Loads of great bands and concerts over 4 days. This was Show of Hands plus orchestra - superb!

Saw lots of 'new to me' acts - some superb, some definitely not!

Hot on the heels of Shrewsbury was our own Swanage Folk Festival. We were blessed with a warm sunny weekend and huge crowds leading to a decent profit for the festival. A year of preparation and planning came to fruition over the weekend, making many people happy.

In November my sister and her husband had joint 70th birthday celebrations, taking a group of friends and family to lunch on a train! It was a freezing cold and very wet day but we were warm and dry on the train! A good time was had by all. I had the pleasure of the company of my great-nephew Sam.


I was greatly looking forward to Christmas celebrations and managed to get to Chipping Sodbury for the day on 23rd December to deliver the parcels for that section of the family. As the day progressed I became croaky and started coughing. By Christmas Eve I was decidedly unwell, coughing up catarrh. I felt hot and sweaty too. I managed to get up Christmas Day and cook lunch for Jen, James and myself before taking to my bed with a fever and feeling really ill. I cancelled my Boxing Day at Craig's and missed seeing the boys :( A week later I am feeling a lot better but still coughing up clear mucus. It seems to have been the mild fluey virus that's been doing the rounds. Very unpleasant but not life threatening. I wish the bug would leave with the old year and I could start 2013 with a clean bill of health, however it looks like just a new box of tissues instead.

I hope 2012 was not too bad for you, and whatever it brings, may 2013 be kind to you.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Who said Christmas is coming?

I have to be in the mood to blog and that time is now!
I cannot believe how the weeks have flown by - Halloween has been and gone - thankfully without incident! I turned off the outside lights and inner hall lights and I was not troubled by callers, apart from my son who popped over and struggled a bit arriving in darkness LOL He was taking his lovely family away for the weekend to see the sights of London and I had a small furry visitor for a few days. Muffin the hamster was a lovely guest - a delight to hold and cuddle, and amusing to watch her chasing Honey! Yes, Muffin was safely installed in her plastic exercise ball (with air holes) and having a free run around much to Honey's puzzlement at this ball following her around. I also popped over to Craig's house to see to the cats. I got the feeling they were not too happy at being left as they did not exactly welcome me. Neither of them wanted a cuddle. They did eat their food, but one had poo'd in the hall near the front door and I narrowly avoided stepping in it when I arrived. I cleaned it all up and cleaned out the litter trays too. I went to wash my hands at the sink with Molly sitting on the window sill behind the taps. I reached out to turn on the taps and got a swipe with claws out for my sins! OUCH! Just a small scratch I thought as the blood slowly welled up and started to drip :( The scab has healed and faded now.

Vin Garbutt at Wessex Acoustic 19/10/12

We've had some great nights at the folk club since September and things seem to be picking up a little. Maybe the recession is loosening its grip a little? I do hope so. The club has a lovely atmosphere with a few extra people on board. We celebrated our 10th birthday with cake, chocolates, and Vin Garbutt!

 

Lucy Ward at Wessex Acoustic 9/11/12

Lucy Ward gave us an amazing night in November - lots of new people came to the club to see her on the strength of her performance at Swanage Folk Festival in September. Her lovely dad, Tony, celebrated his birthday that day by driving her down from Derby and back again the same night despite the offer of beds for the night. Lucy is one of folk's rising stars and making a huge impact wherever she goes.

The bookings are coming in steadily for our next club night too. I do hope the trend continues.

On a personal front I had my annual eye check up as a diabetic and all looks fine. I have some new reading specs a bit stronger than my old ones, but distance is fine and my retina is in good condition. I then had blood tests and my 6 monthly diabetic check up. I saw the nurse first to be weighed and measured and a general chat. I had lost 1.5 stone since the last one and all the blood tests results were good. My blood sugar the day of the test was 5.1, and the long term level was 48 on the new scale (should be 42-52 and was 54 last time) so nurse was happy and when I saw the doc he was delighted. Sugar levels show dietry control is working and losing weight has helped a lot. He has referred me to the orthopaedic surgeons now to get my knees sorted out. I have an appointment just before Christmas so things are in motion. I cannot get a new knee quickly enough now. My right knee has given way on me a few times with shooting pains and wakes me up at night with pain :( so roll on surgery!

I took the decision a few months ago to stop dying my hair and let it go naturally grey.

 

It has grown a bit longer too - not sure whether to keep it this length or a bit shorter. It's well sprinkled with white hairs now with a few darker hairs on the top of my head. All I know is I am looking more and more like my lovely Mum.  Christmas is looming large now and I must crack on with presents. I've not even done a list yet! My son Craig is well switched on and getting my grandsons' main presents for me to wrap so we make sure I get the right things! As Lego is on the list, it also means they can make good use of a 'buy 2 get one free' offer available at the moment.

I am looking forward to a day out next weekend celebrating my sister and brother-in-law's 70th birthdays. They are treating a select bunch of family and friends to lunch out on a steam train! It sounds like a lovely day out and I hope it stays dry for the event.

My son Craig has been busy cleaning out my kitchen cupboards for me. I can't bend down or kneel to get in the bottom cupboards nor stand on ladders for long to reach the top ones, so Craig has 'decluttered' me, filling many sacks with rubbish, a big box to go to the charity shop of good quality usable things that I just don't need any more, and a pile of stuff in the recycle bin. He then cleaned the cupboards inside and out! I actually have space in my cupboards now!! and the tops are clear of assorted 'stuff'. A marathon job and one I really appreciate being done, as it takes me 5 times longer to do the work myself. What a lovely son I have to give up his time with his own family to help me out. Just have the rest of the house to declutter now! Jen - when's your next days off? ;) xxx

Apres Swanage

Doesn't time fly?

Roz with Daniel and Adam

Last time I blogged we were just about to go to Shrewsbury. That's been and gone, a lovely relaxing weekend, apart from a few 'issues' between John & Roz and their grandsons. It was the first time the boys were away camping without Mum & Dad and they missed them, but seemed to have a good time and behaved very well. There were a few toilet issues as it was a walk to the nice, mains plumbed, toilets and sometimes it was a bit too far or there was a queue and someone couldn't hang on long enough.
I managed to see most of the concerts I wanted to see, catching our friends Two Coats Colder on the small village stage. I hope they get a marquee spot next time. They were miles better than some of the acts they had there *cough*Americanos*cough*.

Camp Wessex Acoustic

The weather wasn't brilliant but was mostly dry and cloudy. Not too hot, not too cold and bearably cold at night. I was warm enough with the one 13.5 tog duvet this year. Last year I took a 4.5 tog with me in case it was too warm for 13.5tog and ended up with both on me and my head buried under one to stop my nose freezing in the night!

Dervish

Shrewsbury have upgraded their marquees this year making the main stage 2 better, and making the Sabrina tent bigger with a bigger stage. All good - apart from megalomaniac lighting engineer - just because you CAN have flashing dancing light patterns above the artists doesn't mean you SHOULD. It was very distracting during several performances. I prefer static lighting per song, or minimal subtle changes during a performance. Light patterns whizzing around the tent do nothing to enhance the music.
Back lights that blind the audience are another pet hate of mine... oh lord I am sounding like a real grumpy old woman now. LOL
While I'm on the subject...it is fashionable to have coloured side lighting too and this gives weird effects on photos, but I suppose it adds to the atmosphere in some cases.
Anyway the weekend passed happily. I enjoyed my Koompirs :-) (Turkish jacket potato with a mountain of salad stuff on top - delicious!) and I had fish and chips from Coast & Moor food stand once - fresh and tasty.

Only two weeks later and it was Swanage Folk Festival! This is the one I've spent the last 12 months+ planning and working on with our committee. We were blessed with a warm sunny weekend and the crowds came. Swanage was heaving. Folk Festival, Steam Railway Gala, and day trippers all managed to fill the car parks to overflowing. The whole town was buzzing, or to be more accurate jingling, with Morris dancers bells everywhere!
It wasn't just the town centre alive with mad Morris dancers, some brave souls decided to cool off dancing in the sea on the Sunday after finishing their scheduled dancing. I'm not sure sea water mixes well with Melodeons!
I spent most of the weekend either applying wrist bands to wrists large and small, or driving back and forth to Bournemouth Airport, collecting and returning the delightful Colum Sands who flew in especially from Dublin Airport.
It was a physically tiring weekend but highly pleasurable all round.
We are awaiting the financial outcome for the weekend. It is touch and go. Concert ticket sales were a bit up on last year, and the trade stalls all came and stayed this year. Some did not turn up last year due to an iffy weather forecast, that did not materialise into bad weather as predicted, but this drastically reduced the festival takings.
The festival is totally self funding and does not get any major sponsorship or grants to help with the finances. This means we are not affected by withdrawal of grants or sponsorship at any time, unlike some other festivals who are facing serious problems due to lack of funding. However it means we have to be very careful with costs and pricing. I am hoping we make enough profit to make a charity donation to a local worthy cause.
I found the weight loss I've managed since last year made it a lot easier moving around, but the old knees did complain a bit at night!
Don't expect another blog too soon - I have websites to update!!

Festival Season

It's summer - well some days are summery now and again - so it's festival time!

I've been away to a wonderful weekend in Oxfordshire at Fairport's Cropredy Convention. We were very lucky to get some of the warm, dry, sunny days in August.
The festival was fabulous! Even better in the sunshine :) everyone was happy and smiling.

 
 It was the 45th anniversary of Fairport Convention and I think bigger numbers were expected, but a crowd well over 22,000 came and had a ball! I certainly did.
Lovely meeting old friends and meeting a few new ones too.
The whole festival is outdoors so dry weather is a big help, but they are very well organised and have huge heavy duty tracks laid for traffic in and out of the site and at gates, so even if it turns wet, the ground is protected and we do not have to trudge through mud.
It is camping - but not much time is spent at the tent so we travel and camp fairly lightly. This is our base with Polly on guard.

 She behaved so well over the weekend and loved all the attention she got. She was very popular with children as she is fairly small and very friendly. The family sitting next to us were delighted to play with her at times. Polly was sensible enough to stay in the shade most of the time.
She just tucked in behind our chairs out of the sun and slept.

It was hot in the sun and hats were very useful. Just for once I actually remembered to take mine! It did help a lot but I managed to miss an area of my back with the SPF 30 spray and had a rather sunburned area :(
I also used a small umbrella to keep the sun off my feet and legs so I stayed cool.

We are coming up to the next festival - Shrewsbury. It is a longer stay so it's heavy camping gear and as many home comforts as we can manage to get in the cars. John and Roz are bringing their two young grandsons this year, without their mum and dad. I hope they really enjoy the weekend and still let us have a good time too!
I have done all the washing and now I'm packing the odds and sods bag with all the 'bits' mug, lamps, lighter, snacks, water, pain killers, suntan lotion and leave space for make up and hair brush etc. I've not really studied the line up for the festival but it's looking good with only one clash of concerts I can see. There are 3 main concert marquees and all within an easy walk of where we camp. It's all on the flat and securely enclosed so a pretty safe place to stay. I just hope we don't get noisy neighbours! We are camping in a quiet area so we should be ok, but we are next to family camping and some babies and toddlers can get upset and create a fuss. I hope the grandsons are good :)
Look out for a blog when we get back!
Hope you have a great weekend yourself. xx



Getting the bird!

In nice weather I like to leave my dining room patio doors open wide. This is not a problem with Honey around to chase off any inquisitive cats but it doesn't stop birds flying in! I was watching the Olympic rowing on TV, with Honey asleep by my feet, when I heard a noise in the kitchen. Honey went on alert but would not go in there! Some guard dog eh? As I entered the kitchen there was a flurry at the window. It was a beautiful young thrush who must have flown in the open patio door and found his/her way into the kitchen.

 I shut the doors so it could not fly further into the house and opened the kitchen window wide but it was at the opposite end of the window sill, in the farthest corner away from me. I grabbed a soft tea towel and managed to throw it over the bird to stop it panicking and flapping about. I got my mini steps and managed to half kneel on the work top and sink and reach the bird with a huge plastic bowl. I moved the tea towel so the bird hopped onto it, under the big bowl. Then I slid a tray under the tea towel and gently pulled the tea towel out leaving the bird trapped under the bowl on the tray. I managed to carry this outside and lifted the bowl off the thrush. It sat and looked at me for about 20 seconds then flew off with some loud angry chirrups. I have now closed the patio door!
I remember the fledgling blue tits I had visit me last year but managed to get them to fly out the open window with the help of their mum calling from outside.
I think it must be the angle of the sun causing bright reflections in the patio doors and they think it's more garden - some fly into the glass - with varying consequences :( and the odd bird flies in through the open door. Most realise and fly straight back out again but the odd one keeps going through to the kitchen then head for the window to get out again.
My knee is now complaining after kneeling on the rim of the sink :( a new bruise coming I think!
I finally managed to get a very short clip of Honey running at Baiter yesterday. I have loads of clips of her walking and sniffing while I waited for her to run and she didn't. This time I got the camera out in time for the end of her run!

She usually does 2 or 3 huge circles round the field but only did the one this time. I'll have to try again some time. She has slowed a lot in the last year or so since breaking her leg, but I am so pleased to see her running again for the sheer pleasure of it.
In doggy years she is the same age as me now and really fit, unlike me!

Doesn't she look good?

This is more like me LOL 'resting' in her self made duvet 'nest'

Have a good day - hugs from me and licks from Honey! xx

Where there's a will.....

Beautiful warm sunny day - and I've been to the solicitor to sign my will! Nothing morbid, just an overdue update and refresh of my old will. I do hope all you reading this have made your own will. You may be young and not think it's needed yet but who knows what might happen tomorrow, a car crash, a madman with a gun, an unknown medical condition, anything can happen at any age so please make sure your wishes are known.
It really is a perfect day here - temp about 22°C with a very light sea breeze blowing through the house. I bet the beach is packed and the car parks full!

Sandbanks in the sun

Last night was pub quiz night and it was a bit strange. For months we have been getting around 8-10 teams and usually our team finish in the top 4. Last night there wasn't a chair or stool spare. It was heaving. We had 16 teams! Ashley who runs the quiz was caught a bit short of supplies and left his bag of playing card packs on his drive at home when loading his car. His wife came to the rescue with a late delivery! The questions were quite tricky at times and the scores reflected this by being lower than usual. It was just Jen and I pitting our brains for our team and we struggled a bit. We finished 5th on the main quiz and won nothing on the pictures or music quizzes. However we had a fun night out and I had a lovely plate of ham and pineapple salad.

Not the actual dish but similar

It was huge and very tasty, apart from the chef being a bit heavy handed with the Radicchio - it's a bit bitter and I had a mountain of the stuff! I left half of it and ate the rest of the lovely salad. The ham was diced into small chunks to make a little look a lot more, a technique I notice they are using on several dishes now - the pork in cider sauce used to be 2 steaks of pork but is now a few chunks instead - barely one steak's worth! One way to reduce costs and maximise profit! I think the kitchen were a bit pushed last night as quite a few people were dining before the quiz.

The newly replaced rotary washing line is fully loaded with 2 loads of washing - still hanging space but I've run out of pegs! Maybe I'll buy another pack next time I shop.

This week is between my daughter's birthday and my son's birthday so we are having a family barbecue tomorrow as a joint celebration. Should be the perfect evening for it. Craig does a mean barbie!

 As this week may be the only real summer we get ,make the most of it while it's here!

xxx