First snow

Last night at around 11 pm, as I sat cowering in the kitchen while the fireworks of Diwali, the Asian Festival of Light, hammered the air like a WW2 bombing attack, it began to snow. I didn't notice at first as I was too busy poring over the atlas, wondering if there was any country on earth where fireworks were banned, to which I could move and live in peace. At the sound of a big explosion, I have a visceral response. I flinch, cry out, my stomach knots and I want to dive into a cupboard and cry. (See my Nov 2007 post for an explanation as to why this might be.) Last night, I simply stuffed earplugs in, which made watching CSI a bit difficult as I'm not good at reading American lips.

Then I glanced outside and noticed a large, feathery flake floating past the patio doors. And another. It was a bit wet, but settling. The outdoor temperature was 30F.



This morning, the snow had gone but the decking was a sheet of ice upon which Mr Grumpy nearly measured his length in his carpet slippers as he went to feed the fish. If he had done so, he would have landed face-first in a frozen fox turd, which our red friend had kindly deposited right where we step out of the door. Such is life!

The temperature in my study is 48F as I write (why, oh why was Mr G so sparing with the radiators when he modernised his house?) and the snow that still clung to the roof window has just started to melt. I have been on the web ordering thermal underwear - long johns and long sleeved T-shirt. They promise delivery in 3 days, though I may well have turned into snow woman by then with a long icicle hanging from my nose. I think we're in for a hard winter.

My chemist's shop

My transformation into the Aunty Vera of the old Giles cartoons (she of the perpetually dripping, pointy nose, thin, drooping body and tote bag full of pills, potions and boxes of tissues) is no recent thing. It was already fully developed 30 years ago when I left my first (and only) husband and after I had gone he complained that he had had to throw out a large cardboard box full of pills and potions that I had left behind. Being a man whose bathroom cabinet contained nothing more than some sticking plasters and a bottle of TCP, he couldn't understand my need for verucca plasters, Friars Balsam and ear drops. When he got things, he just put up with them till they either went or, like the grumbling appendix that flared up every time he ate peanuts (did he quit eating them? did he hell!), hospitalised him.

I now have a set of plastic drawers ('set', note; not 'pair'. Those will probably come in ten or so years' time), each of which is dedicated to a different set of ailments. Painkillers and antihistamines inhabit the top drawer, as those are the things I usually need in a hurry. The drawer beneath holds everything connected with stomachs, such as cures for diarrhoea, constipation and piles (yes, I know bottoms are not stomachs, but there seems to be a direct connection), and my ulcer tablets.

The third drawer is labelled Beauty (yes, I can hear those snickers, thank-you). In it are lipsticks, eye shadows and pencils, hand cream, lip salves and lots of those sample tubes of Clinique and Clarins moisturisers. I also keep sachets of Lincobeer combined shampoo and condtioner (so handy for holidays), plus hairslides and bands there, plus a tiny furry teddy bear. No, I don't know why, either.

The fourth drawer is where I keep large bottles of anything from cough linctus to vitamin pills, as it and the fifth are deeper than the others, so bottles and jars can stand upright in it. I must own up that there are some things in there, the purpose of which I cannot now remember. L-Theanine? WTF?) But as long as they are not past their sell-by, they can remain there rubbing shoulders with Vitamin D and Peppermint Oil capsules for as long as they like.

Now we get to the bottom drawer. This holds a large bag of Slippery Elm powder, only slighly past its sell-by (Jan 08), a digital thermometer which I tardily discovered was in degrees Centigrade (36? I must be dead!) and a collection of ankle supports, wrist supports and only slightly grubby crepe bandages. Oh, and a plastic bag containing those tiny tubes of Bazooka That Verucca and Blist-eze that always lose their caps and ooze stickily into sponge bags if not coralled in plastic, plus tiny vials of homoeopathic and Bach flower remedies.

You may think that's it, my chemist's shop is complete, but you'd be wrong. Beneath the bathroom basin is a cupboard. Well, it's Mr Grumpy's cupboard to be precise, but the only trace of his former ownership is a congealed and rusting can of Gillette shaving gel. I have filled the cupboard with products pertaining to hair, teeth and body. Fragrances, hairspray, BOGOFs of toothpaste, spare brushes, body lotions, hair mousse, all the tall cans and containers that one needs in the bathroom and that won't fit in my plastic drawers. (Oh, go on, you're allowed one snigger).

Someone suggested that way back in time, I must have been the village Wise-woman, dispensing cures and love potions to all and sundry plus their horse and dog. Well, oddly enough, I had an ancestor who was called Gaspard Wyse, rather than wise) and he was... an apothecary in Liverpool! Many a true word spoken in jest. (What was that, indigestion? Hold on, I have a pill for that somewhere.)

50 years on!

Yesterday I met a fellow pupil from primary school in Liverpool. We hadn't seen each other since we were 11. I felt really nervous beforehand, wondering what on earth we would find to say to each other. A whole lifetime had gone by for each of us, after all.

Her name is Pam and she found me on Friends Reunited and I needn't have worried because we were soon swapping notes about Mr Jones, the head, and Miss Bocock and Miss Parry. Lunch spend by, once we'd failed to get into the restaurant I'd earmarked, and dismissed three others as looking like school canteens. We ended up in a quaint little pub, where we quaffed some wine, ate turkey sandwiches (well, I did, she had a Ploughmans) and tried to name all the faces on the old photo. Sadly, we knew some faces we couldn't put names to, and vice versa.

I hope Pam and I will meet up again. It's a strange feeling thinking we shared six years of lessons then became total strangers for four whole decades! I've been back on the site and emailed a couple more familiar names. Ann Smeaton, Paul Winkles, Marion Moncrieff, Zella Jones, where are you now?

(PS I'm 3rd from left on the 2nd row from the back, in the grey jumper with lambs on that my mum knitted. I lost the matching cardie at the Liverpool air show. Mum was not amused.)

Hat trick

Here's the photo from the other day, doctored by Jacula who thought I was doing a Tommy Cooper impersonation. Love that fez! Talking of which, I can thoroughly recommend the entertaining travel book, A Fez of the Heart, by Jeremy Seal. Very funny and a good insight into life in Turkey.

Hard-hearted Virgin

I have in my hand a pair of rail tickets to take me to Penrith next Monday to see my sister, and back again. I haven't seen her for at least 18 months, apart from a brief couple of hours when we rendez-voused (sp?) in Liverpool last December to swap presents.

Due to the untimely death of the son of one of my closest friends, brother to my goddaughter, I now have a funeral to go to. It is in Shropshire next Wednesday, bang in the middle of the Cumberland visit. This morning, I rang Virgin trains and patiently explained the situation, only to be told that no refunds were allowed under any circumstances.

"But this is a funeral!" I emphasised. "People don't choose when to die. Show a bit of sympathy and understanding and give me a refund."

The jobsworth with the very strange accent and mangled English kept insisting that Virgin tickets were non-refundable and referring me to the terms and conditions, which were not printed on the back of the tickets. I can rebook and lose a £10 admin charge, or throw away the money, just like I had to do earlier in the year when I'd booked to go to Devon and my daughter was ill and said I'd better not come. I am not free again for a 5-day stretch until the very end of November when the hours of daylight will be few, the air full of driving, boot-soaking rain and Ullswater will be lapping at my sister's kitchen door, as it always does when it rains a lot. I have to let them know when I want to re-book by Saturday, said the unsympathetic customer services robot.

What is wrong with these companies? Surely, if you give them enough notice, you should be entitled to a refund? They can always re-sell the ticket, after all. I am just hopping mad. Has everyone forgotten the word, 'humanity'?

Pond protection

Mr G spent all morning yesterday making a wooden framework and nailing that hideous orange plastic netting that road maintenance men use onto it, to stop one-year-old Ethan falling in. Every time he visits, he takes an unholy interest in the pond and the fish. We took our eyes off him for an instant last weekend and he was halfway in, dangling over the edge trying to catch a fish. In view of the terrible tragedy this week with the twins who fell into a pond, resulting in the death of one of them, Mr G decided it had to be done.

"That's strong enough," he proudly proclaimed. "I stood on it and it took my weight." Not to be outdone, I placed one foot and about three quarters of my weight on it. There was a serious of explosive snapping sounds and the whole thing began to give way. Some nasty snipes about my weight followed (around 10 stone if you must know), but Mr G was actually grateful for my demonstration and this morning we went to B&Q to buy some wire netting which he is now busily attaching to the frame with orange tags and a staple gun.

I shall try it later and if I fall in, I hope the camera will be handy.

PS I did try it later, I didn't fall in, but note the look of apprehension at the thought of plunging into five feet of cold water full of fish poo.

Wiggin' out

My new astrology column requires a photo of moi to head it up. As Scarlet is a raunchy magazine,
most of the ladies whose photos appear in it are holding vibrators and looking perky. They are also at least 30 years younger than me. So out I went to buy some party wigs and props. The results, a friend of mine commented bluntly, don't do me any favours but boy, I had fun. Mr Grumpy did a real David Bailey, with a white sheet and a stepladder. I wonder which one the mag will choose? A zany Dolly Parton-like blonde (sadly minus famous appendages), a witchy brunette or a natural freckly ginger? As for the 'vibe'... is it a torch? A candle? I shall leave you guessing.