Presentation completed and exams to come!

Last Thursday, the day of the dreaded presentation finally arrived. My group was presenting next to last, which was late in the afternoon. This meant that we were watching everyone elses presentations and started to feel increasingly nervous.

We felt that we had done everything we could to answer the questions as accurately as we could and to cover all aspects, but after listening to everyone else, it appeared as they were mainly concentrating on the changes from "moving from an institutional home to independent living".

However, we did get an amazing response from "the audience", our tutor and the assessors. They all loved our case study and the way it was presented. It was Carol who created Summer and she presented her to the audience as herself. She was very good.

Afterwards there was a little presentation for our tutor, which caused her to be in tears. The head of Social Services was there and he was also in tears and one of the assesrs from the college got up and said that she goes to various presentations from all over the country, but these, last Thursday, were amongst the best she had ever seen, which ofcourse set Di off into tears again (and some of us).

All in all, it turned out to be a wonderful day, and it beats a day in the office anyway. Now I need to concentrate on the remaining two assignments and then it will soon be time for exams. Two exams of 1.5 hours each and they are both on the same day: 14th of March, only 6 weeks to go.

New grandson, Vidar

Here's a picture of my new grandson, born on Monday 22nd January 2007 at 7.40 PM. He weighed in at at nearly 10lbs and was 20" long. His name is Vidar [veedar] and in the piccie he is only 12 hours old.

Presentation, etc

Can you believe that it is past half-way through January already? I thought we were going to have some lighter evenings soon, but there are no signs of them yet. The weather, however, has been atrocious, which doesn't help. Gales and tropical rain every day and dead grey and miserable even when it hasn't rained. What happened to winter?

At work it has been very busy, as usual. Lisa applied for a support workers position and got it, so she will be leaving us soon. That is such a shame for us; we will miss her, but it is the job she always wanted, so we have to be pleased for her. We will enjoy the leaving party though, next Saturday.

My Mental Health course is nearing the end now and on Thursday we are having a group presentation. This has been booked in at a hotel, where we are going to have a carvery lunch and the head of social services is going to come and watch and also an assessor from the college. My group consist of Carol from maintenance, Laura from Partnership, Sue from the Club houses and me. We have done a case study on a 19-year old, white girl, who is suffering from depression.

It is first time for a very, very long time that Carol, Sue and myself have done a presentation as we are all over 40. However, Laura is only 22 so she is finding it a little easier and is helping us "oldies" a lot. We don't know what we would do if we didn't have her. We are absolutely dreading it and it doesn't help that someone in our class told us that last year 4 pupils failed the presentation. That will probably be us this year! The draw for the order which the groups are presenting has been done and my group will be hanging around waiting most of the day as we are presenting next to the last. I'll let you know how we went on.

Birthday, Christmas & New Year

Wow, haven't the last two weeks flown?

Since my last post we have had Works do, Chris' birthday, Christmas, stay at John and Ann's and a New Year. It wasn't as quiet as we thought it was going to be and, as usual, we didn't get done half of what we wanted to do. Never mind, we did enjoy the break though.

A few weeks ago, I bought a fish tank from the car boot sale. Chris had the lid and lights for his birthday and also a book about "Setting up an aquarium". After Christmas we went to a pet shop and bought the gravel, which took the two of us all evening to clean up and rinse through.

Last Friday we got the plants and 12 little baby goldfish and set it all up. We sat down and enjoyed the display as Rumpleteazer entertained us greatly with her curiosity. She was absolutely determined to get to the fish, one way or another. It took several days before she gave up, but it didn't half amuse us.

The works do at China Gardens was a great success; I had a fab time. Christmas Day was quiet but enjoyable. We had loads of present, some funny ones, some more serious ones, but they were all excellent, thanks to all our family and friends.

Boxing Day we went to John and Ann's and we had a wonderful time. Andy and Amy came as well as Mum and Margaret so we all played games until midnight. Chris and I had been invited to stop over, so there was no drinking and driving to worry about. Great Thanks!

Last Saturday we went to Lee and Pod's with Barb and Bill. Pod's mum, auntie Bet and John and Jimmy also came and another smashing time was had by all.

New Year's Eve we had planned to go on top of the hill again, as usual, but this year there were weather warnings and gales, so we gave it a miss and watched the celebrations in Sydney on TV. Sadly, most of the famous celebrations, such like Edinburgh and Glasgow, were cancelled due to the weather, but there were still some grand fireworks in London.

First Frost

I woke up this morning and found frost on the windscreen. It wasn't much and it wasn't at all noticable anywhere else, but we are getting there. This mornings wheather forecast was predicting that we might have a couple of degrees frost for Christmas as well, so that would be nice. So far there has been no sign of any snow and it's not likely to come this year :-(

It has been a long, slow week and it's still only Wednesday! Another two full days at work before Christmas. I am so ready for a break!!!

On Monday we had our Christmas meal at work and the "secret santa" came and gave me a beautiful knitted set of hat, gloves and a scarf. My secret santa was Dave and the person who I needed to buy for was Gary. I bought him a T-shirt with a caricature figure of a Port Vale fan peeing on a Stoke fan. He was over the moon with that; said he has a mate who is a Stoke fan, so he shall enjoy winding the mate up with it.

All week we have been listening to Christmas CDs at work. The athmosphere has been lovely and everyone are excited. The house is looking very festive, as usual, but there hasn't been much effort done at work. I have a bit of tinsel around my monitor but nobody else has done anything.

Joint Christmas Present

This year Chris and I decided to buy a joint Christmas present for each other. Last time we went camping, our gazebo got damaged by the wind. This was mainly due to the fact that it only was a cheap and flimsy thing in the first place; made of thin aluminium poles.

We have always wanted a proper steel gazebo, preferably a pop-up type but they are usually around £300. However, we did notice a while ago that they are being sold quite reasonably on eBay, so we thought that we could try to get one for less than Fifty (plus postage).

At last, this weekend we were lucky and managed to get one for £47.00 + £20 for postage. It arrived today, and it looks every bit as good as it seemed in the advert. It has 4 zipped sides, two plain green and two with windows. Judging by the weight it ought to be strong enough to withstand any normal windy night. Even the material seems stronger than our old one.

Here is a picture of Chris fine-tuning the old gazebo last summer. We always attach it to the tent to utilise the most of the space.

This is the picture of our new one as it was in the advert on eBay. We haven't put it up yet so we have no photos of our own yet.

Christmas Lights switch on

It's that time of the year again! Yesterday was the big switch on of the lights in Hanley. Santa's parade arrived, complete with Rudolph and the other reindeers. Signal Radio was there recording the event live and a quire was singing Christmas songs.

The best of it all, though, was the snow machine. It squirted out real snow in big flakes. It looked fabulous; glowing in the street-lamp lights against the dark sky, just as if it was snowing for real.

Tontine Square and all the surrounding area was absolutely packed with people. The atmosphere was wonderful, almost like a good football match.

At half past seven the Lord Mayer got on stage and switched all the town centre Christmas lights on and immediately we were all excited.

This was the start of the late night shopping and Debenhams had a sale on and were going to be open until midnight. We were all promised free parking after 6.30 every night until New Years Eve.

New Card - fingers crossed

Yes, I have finally managed to get all the relevant paperwork together to set up my new card. According to the logo on the Ryanair site, this card will be acceptable to them (hopefully!!!).

Just need to wait to get paid so that I can put some money in it and then I can get the tickets. It is really exciting, but I am still a bit concerned about it until I have actually tried it. Roll on payday.

Autumn Blues

It seems sad that I only seem to get around to write here when I’m off sick. Yes, I’m off again, with flu this time. Actually, I think I’m on the mend as I have had it since Sunday. However, this morning I did go to work but only after a few hours I was sent home again. Apparently, I wasn’t well enough but I’m hoping another few hours will make the difference tomorrow.

Last weekend we went off-road driving, which was great. Sadly, It was our last camping trip of the year but the site that we stayed at was fabulous. It had a narrow gauge steam railway station on one side of the site and a beautiful brook on the other. We definitely want to go back there some time in the future. At least we seem to have a bit more space now that the camping stuff has gone back up the loft.

This time of the year can be so depressing. The nights are starting to draw in and we are having to have the heating on in the mornings. I had to move the olive trees in to the corner and wrap some plastic around them, because the temperatures can drop below 10 degrees at night. I’m hoping to be able to leave them there for a couple of months yet as I still have tomatoes growing in the conservatory.

Only a couple of weeks until the clocks change and then it will be dark when driving back at night, not a nice thought. Still it could be an opportunity to catch up with some of those jobs that don’t get done in summer, such as the decorating. I noticed the other day that some of it is looking a bit tatty.

There has been no further development with the card problem. Ryanair have apologised for the inconvenience, but as yet they have done nothing to solve the problem. I suppose that they don't really know what the problem is themselves and unless a lot of people complain, they don't want to go to the trouble of finding out either.

Anyway, Chris is hoping to get another card, so maybe that will work with Ryanair. The trouble is that they are short-staffed at his works so he is working 12hour shifts. The extra money is useful but it doesn't leave him any time for anything else.

A few days ago we went to a car boot sale and I spotted a Mamas and Papas pushchair for sale at a very low price, so I got it. It needs cleaning but I’m sure it would be great for when Sanna comes because of the styling it can be used both for a baby or for a toddler, so if she comes in the next couple of years, it will be one thing less to bring. I’m sure with 3 kids the car will be full enough.

Here are some photos of both settings. I am hoping that Sanna knows how to fasten the shopping bag, because I don’t.

Pay Day

Never have i been waiting as long for pay day as i did this last month, but I think I might finally have recovered from the MOT fiasco, thank goodness. Now I can look forward to life returning back to normal again.

Even though the weather has been amazing, it is beginning to be noticable that we are coming up to that depressing time of the year again. It is already slightly darker in the house when I get home at night and it wont be long before the sun will have gone down by 5 and then before we know it, it's dark.

Never mind, on a brighter note we still have one more long camping weekend to look forward to at the end of the month. We have been invited by Landrover to take part in a half-day of off-road driving, so we decided to make a long weekend of it and go camping on Thursday to Sunday. It will more than likely to be the last time this year, so best to make the most of it.

Otherwise, life here has been quiet with nothing much to report. Chris is working overtime so he is working from 6 in the evening to 6 in the morning for 4 days in a row. My college work is getting there, slowly. I have done two assignments and working on the third. The cats are fine but still don't get on too well. The other night Teazer got her nose scratched but she didn't seem too bothered about it.

Can't think of anything else to write about. Good Night!

Debit Card problems

Ever since I promised Tessa to buy the tickets to come and visit in October, I have been trying to think of a way that I can buy them. Ryanair will only accept payment over the internet but they won't accept Paypal. As I don't have a debit card nor a credit card, I thought I'll open a new account where I could get one. For this I chose HSBC bank and filled in all the necessary forms, etc.

They soon sent me a letter saying they needed more information such as a "certified" copy of my current bank statement. After debating about what "certified" meant, I decided that it was an original paper statement sent to me from the bank which I then had their signature put on. Obviously, this was not going to happen (neither certified nor otherwise) as i have opted not to receive paper statements for many years ago. They are just a waste of paper and put an uneccessary strain on trees. I explained this to HSBC bank but to no prevail. They are not interested in having me as their customer. Ce la vie, in the long run it's their loss, not mine.

However, I still haven't solved the problem of buying the airline tickets and hope that the plane doesn't fill up enough for the prices to go up, by the time I have come up with a solution.

Stupid Japanese thrash!

My car is nearly 3 years old and therefore due its first MOT. I have known for a while that I need new tyres but since they were faulty I was hoping to convince Mitsubishi to give me something towards them but they wouldn't cooperate.

So, I decided to squeeze my purse and managed to scrape together enough money for two tyres and the MOT. I thought that I can always get the other two tyres in the next couple of months or so. It had completely got out of my mind that of course, the tax was also due at this time. So, not only did I need to fork out £150 for tyres and MOT but I had to also find another £80 for the tax. Then I had the shock of a lifetime. Never in a million years did I expect a car that had done 12,000 miles to fail the MOT, but it did. Brake pads, hand brake, CV joint, etc meant that now I had to immediately find yet another £150 to get it through the MOT.

The nature of my job, of course, means that if I don't have a car; I don't work. So the only thing I could do is to try to borrow the money of someone, quickly and luckily Chris' mum leant it to me. Consequently, ever since then and up to next payday, we have been living on beans and rice. It is extremely fortunate that I give a lift to a neighbour's lad who also works in Hanley. He gives me £5 per week for petrol, so i have been able to go to work.

So much for buying a new car so that I don't have these unexpected, huge garage bills!!!!

Heat Wave

Oh Dear, I had no idea that it had been so long since I'd written a blog. Ever since we got back from Mexico Britain has been hit by a seriously, major heatvawe. we have beaten the all time record of 36.6 degrees to a new record of 37 degrees Celsius.

Of course, we are all suffering with it as we are not at all used to that kind of temperatures, and here in Britain it is so humid. I heard on the news, the other day, that in Paris the temperatures reached 40 and it made me feel ashamed of complaining about our temperatures.

Anyway, i have been trying to remind folks that it is just as hot in Lebanon . . . . . . . what have we really got to complain about.

Anyway, what have I been up to since my birthday? Apart from work, work and more work we have been camping in Essex and we also went camping in Leek, last weekend. In the evenings we have been behaving rather sad as we have been going bed early with the airconditioning on. Neither Chris and I are as good with the heat as we thought we were (which proves that maybe we are not quite ready to move to Spain yet).

In the last couple of weeks we have been promised a good thunderstorm, however, so far this hasn't happened. Tonight it went so , so black that I was convinced it was coming. I brought both of the cats in since I didn't want them to wander off and get caught in it, but yet again , to my disappointment, nothing happened!

Looking back at the year, I get very worried and think: where has the time gone? It doesn't feel more than a few weeks since Sanna and Co were here, yet it's nearly Tova's birthday and it has gone over six months since that dreadful day when they were at the airport waitning to go home. I could never wish that on anybody, let alone a family with small kids.

Lee and Pod have gone to Thailand to meet Lee's sister, Hannah, (who lives in Aussieland) for her 21st birthday. From what I gather, from their sms is that they are having a whale of a time with booze, drink, booze, etc. Apparently, they have been waving the Swedish flag whilst out on a night of drinking.

Talking of the Swedish flag. . . was i not so sorry that we didn't manage to beat Sweden in the World Cup? I felt a bit better when I was told that we havn't beaten Sweden for over 38 years...! By the way...I wanted the frogs to win, maynly because i like Thierry Henry. He is a great player, even though I'm not an Arsenal supporter. at least we did a teeny weeny bit better than Mexico and Sweden in the end (for what it's worth).

What else has happened since my birthday? I have invited Tessa to visit in October. In Sweden October can be a funny month; bit of an early winter or maybe an late autumn??? Here in England October, of course means rain, but is it an Indian summer or is it early autumn? I must admit...I at this moment (as I sit here at 29 degrees C at 11.20 pm) I can't think of anything nicer than a bit of hearty British rain, together with the damp and cold that comes with it, ooooooh!

Anyway, I shall get off and make some tea.

CATS

Today, I have been on holiday beause Chris took me to see the world-famous, Broadway Musical, Cats, which we are immensly lucky to have right here in Stoke for 3 weeks only. The tickets were an early birthday present, as he knew that I have always wanted to see Cats and I would never be able to watch it on Broadway.

I still have the original LP up in the loft but of course haven't been able to play it for years, but it all soon came back to me. It started off with a yard full of rubbish and scrap metal and then the lights went out and everything went black. Slowly dozens and dozens of pairs of cats eyes shone brightly in the rubbish and then loads of colourful strips of lights came on, flashing and chasing, just like Christmas lights. Then the music started and the cast came in.

It started with "the naming of cats", "the invitation to the Jellicle ball" and "the Gumbie cat" followed by "The Rum Tum Tugger", "Grizabella, the glamour cat" and "Bustopher Jones". Then it was time for "Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer" which of course we loved very much. Before the break we had "Old Deuteronomy", "The Jellicle ball" and "Memory".

The break was roughly about 20 minutes and was swiftly followed by "The moments of happiness" and "Gus: the theatre cat". The next session was quite unfamiliar to me so I think I might have the Broadway version on my LP. That was "Growltiger's last stand" and "Skimbleshanks". "Macavity" still had the same words from TS Eliots poem but the music was slightly different (I prefer the original version). The show finished with "Mr Mistoffelees", "Journey to the heaviside layer", "the ad-dressing of cats" and a most beautiful version of "Memory".

I bought myself a brochure for keepsake. It was one of the best birthday presents for a long time, thanks Chris,X

New addition to the family!

Yes, first we had none and then we have one and now we have two. Meet our little girl, Rumpleteazer. She is 5 years old and we have had her since Sunday.

It's a complicated story... A friend of Lee and Pod's was asked to look after Rumpleteazer when the friends friend went on holiday for two weeks, she reluctantly agreed (as one does), but when her friend returned from holiday, she no longer wanted the cat back. Lee and Pod's friend was now lumbered with a cat that she didn't want in the first place and Lee and Pod could not have her because of Charlie (the parrot).

This is why we have her and I am so pleased. She is absolutely gorgeous, very friendly and affectionate and immensly well-behaved. She seems to have settled in so well but sadly we have to uproot her again on Friday, as we are going camping and need to take her with us. I'm sur she will soon settle again, and she may as well get used to the camping, right from the start.

Mexico - Climate & Creatures

The only problem we had was the heat. The temperature was between 30 and 33 nearly all the time, even at night. We found that very difficult to cope with as we would prefer temperatures between 24 and 28. Even though we were so careful, using factor 25, etc, I still managed to get sunburned on a cloudy day. I didn't think the sun could be so strong that it would burn through the clouds, so I didn't use sun cream that day.

The last couple of days in Cancun was hard as we really had enough of the heat and tired of walking around, but at the same time we didn't want to waste any time, so we felt obligated to go out. Neither of us like to sun bathe or spend much time on the beach, so it meant either riding around on the bus or walking. Even though we had a shower 3 times every day, we still always felt wet and hot and itchy. There must have been a particularly vicious type of mosquito there as even Chris got bitten by them and normally they wont touch him.

On the last day, everyone else in the hostel were laughing at us because we wanted to get to the airport early, just so we can enjoy the air conditioning. To our disappointment, we found that it wasn't working when we got there. However, it was just as well that we had plenty of time as there was a lot of problems with check-in and potentially we could have missed the deadline for our flight.

Anyway, after an uneventful 10 hours we landed at Manchester the following day. Then we spent 17 hours sleeping of the jetlag. Was it all worth it in the end? No - good old Spain is what we are sticking with in the future, cheaper, cooler and less hassle but it was a good experience and we loved the food.

Mexico - Socialising

At night time we often spent a bit of time socialising with the other guests. These were from all over the world but we got particularly close to some Austrians, one who lived in Bali and another who lived in Florida; a French girl who lived there, training to work at the consulate; a couple of Canadian girls; a Mexican lad; a French lad and a girl from Costa Rica. It was really interesting to speak to these people as when we go away normally, we only get to see English people or "Spanglish" as they call themselves (meaning people who are English but live in Spain).

Anniversary

On our 10th anniversary we sailed across to a close-by island called Isla Muheres (the island of women), where we managed to get on a boat tour around the island. This also included snorkelling, which Chris participated in, but I didn't want to get my clothes wet, so I just watched and enjoyed the sun, sea and the quietness. It was a fantastic day, which was finished of with a Mexican meal at a lovely restaurant.

Mexico - continued

The next few days was spent looking around the local area, just jumping on a bus to travel to the hotel zone, etc. We were amazed how cheap everything was. Of course we had to check out the beach and swim in the famous Caribbean sea, and yes, the water really is turquoise and the sand really is snow white.

Halfway through the holiday we took a trip to a place called Chichen Itza. Here they had ruins of pyramids dating back to AD900. The bus took 3 hours to get there and the same to get back, yet on the map it seemed like we've been nowhere.

Mexico - Day One

We finally arrived in Cancun after a long (seemed to take forever) flight. It seemed funny that, although it should be around 7pm, the time was only 1pm in Cancun. We took a bus from the airport to the bus station and then walked the last bit to the hostel. We were quite pleased to find that, although the hostel was very basic, it was quite ok for what we paid.

We set about to explore the immediate area and bought some supplies. We soon noticed that the locals spoke very little English and the little Spanish that we spoke was not much use in Mexico as their Spanish was quite different. With the help of sign language and mobile phone pictures we did manage to get by though.