Me on Monday - relieved to have him home

It's been a getting Mr M to the hospital for his minor surgery, worrying most of Saturday until I got him home, sleazing on Sunday until Dinner with the Bluefunnels sort of a weekend.

Mr M has been waiting for six months to go in for a small operation that for anyone else would be a day case and home. Because he has diabetes they have to ensure that they cover their asses and make sure his sugar levels don't spiral out of control and stuff like that. He had to go in on Friday after work. He didn't finish work until 8pm so YS took him down - his own plan was to drive the car down there and park it in the car park and then when he came out drive home. We persuaded him otherwise, thank goodness and so I woke up after a fitful night's sleep and from 5,30am and was NOT worrying.
He sent me a text saying he was second on the list and then what seemed like days later he texted to say he was waiting for the discharge papers and his phone was dying. I changed my shoes and collected my handbag and went to the hospital, found him and this got things moving so that I could text YS and he came and collected us.
It was decidedly good to have Mr M home and as YS and the rest of the family were all out celebrating a 50th birthday we ordered chinese food and sleazed.
On Sunday I checked my tomato plants and picked four - yes four! lovely tomatoes. A message from Lady B asked if we felt like travelling up to their house in the clouds for dinner. YS had never been up there so we all trooped up the hill and enjoyed a really relaxing evening with good food, good company and a huge amount of laughter. There was gravy so Mr M asked for his bib before he started his meal but it was me that ended up with the dinner medals all down the front of my shirt. This reminded me why I don't eat gravy.
Lady B is recovering well from her knee replacement - well according to everyone else she is way ahead of where she is expected to be in her recovery but as far as she is concerned it is too slow, much too slow. It is four weeks since her operation and she still has swelling and she can't run yet!! Everyone else is gasping for breath at the speed of her recovery - ah it is so good to see that some things never change. She never did like waiting
So that's Me on Monday, invented by Sian over at FromHighInTheSky why not take a look over there now that you've read mine.

Me on Monday Injured and hurting

It's been a fixed the car, shopped at Costco, shopped at Morrisons, read hurtful things about me on a forum, made sunday dinner and cut my finger, allowed both hurts to get to me sort of a weekend.

The car has been fixed so no more water is escaping through grotty pipes. This is the good thing. We shopped at Costco and forgot some essentials but bought a fly zapper - one of those blue light thingies you see in food shops. Mr M has wanted one for years so it sits up on the top of the cupboard and glows bluely. I sneakretly like it too, it is a gadget and I do crave gadgets.

Saturday YS went off to his school reunion - I am not sure I understand these things other than that they are a place to show everyone you hated at school how well you have done in the intervening years. If you haven't made the effort to keep in touch then those people will probably not find a niche in your real life. But there you are, even though family history fascinates me, looking back into my past is not something I do very often .... unless there's a good story and then I can reminisce with the best of you. I walked out of school at the earliest possible moment and never looked back I kept in touch with one person afterwards but even that link has gone now.

I posted some useful information that our local FH Society had on their website onto a genealogy forum. I said that Parishchest.com had sent out an email to all the traders on their website telling them that PC would be closing down on 10th August. A lot of people who didn't know this immediately emailed PC who f*cking denied it and went onto another forum to tell people not to believe the rumours! Then a member of the forum where I put my post - in all innocence I might add - had a go at me for spreading rumours and untruths. It was explained to them that I had posted and 9.22pm and they had posted on the other forum the change of mind that they were now looking at selling to someone else and not closing at 7.01am the following day.

Did I get an apology? of course not, one of the posters on the other forum even went so far as to hint that I posted out of spite. I have not and will not post on the forum where I originally posted and I am not allowed to post on the other forum because they refused my membership - because of what the woman from PC said about me. This festered over the weekend and was not helped by cutting my finger on the grater-plate of my food processor. I don't do things like that. I rarely cut myself but I had successfully grated carrot and stuff for the coleslaw and when I was washing the plate it turned in my hand and cut my ring finger on my left hand just on the edge of my nail. BOY did that hurt and I bled like a stuck pig, all over the sink and the drainer and the floor and the tea towel and the roll of kitchen paper and the table and Mr M as he was being the ministering angel and sticking a plaster on it.
Feeling a lot better for having got that off my chest so my thanks to Sian for inventing Me on Monday. and Thank you for reading this

Car saga revisited

It was losing water!!! This caused overheating which made it go into "limp mode"

The problem was that they could not find where it was doing this losing of water. They had it from Wednesday to Friday and Mr M brought it home - he was sick of driving the courtesy daewoo because his knees were bruising his ears and Mr M is not built for folding.

When he arrived home he did the usual three-point turn at the top of the street and when he got out he could clearly see the trail of water on the road surface. He discussed it with Youngest Son who said "Let's go and have a look." so they did but they could not see where the water was coming from, no puddle under the engine.

Mr M said he would do another turn around and see if that helped so YS stood and watched and as the car pulled forward it revealed a large puddle - under the BACK of the car. The pipes that take the hot water to the rear heaters were leaking like a sieve! A quick call the the garage and at 8am today they took it down and showed them exactly where it is leaking. It is being fixed as I write

Who would think to look at the rear of a car for a water leak on the cooling system? Well not them or us obviously. Thank goodness that YS began his army career in vehicle maintenance before changing trades.

Me on Monday sorry Tuesday. - sick car

It was a weekend of good ideas thwarted, staying home knitting and unknitting and having to dry uniforms in the house because it is raining.

Mr M had a really good idea for one of the Summertime Photography Scavenger Hunt pictures so on Saturday morning we set off, stopping for fuel and a bottle of water on the way. We were, to quote from The Blues Brothers "Heading north to put the word on the streets".
Well, perhaps not literally.
Anyhoooo, off we went. Along the A4042 heading for Abergavenny then onto the bypass. As we passed the turning that leads back into Abergavenny the car began to slow down and there was no vrooom when Mr M pressed the accelerator - sorry to get so technical - so we turned into the road that led back and kind of coasted into the first layby. We waited a few minutes then Mr M tried again but still no vrooom. I rang the AA and the very nice lady took the details and then said "the time is now 10.10am and the patrolman will be with you by 11.30am"
So we waited. We opened the back of the car and had a good sort out and then fixed the very back seat - it's a seven seat Kia Sedona and the back seat can be pushed forward to make more luggage space. Somehow it had got itself half pushed forward so it flopped about when we were travelling, very irritating.
We got back into our seats and waited.
We had a little snooze and then waited some more. Then the nice man rang me to make sure he knew where we were.
He arrived. turned the key, the car started but we knew that would happen. He pressed the accelerator and it vrooomed!!
They kept the engine running and stood by the open bonnet (Hood for my American  readers) and had what looked like a serious discussion. I was sitting in my seat working out how to strangle a car so I couldn't hear them.
He filled out the form, I signed it and off we went. By this time it was too late to go where we intended for the picture so we headed for Paige's Fish and Chips in Cwmbran and b****r me if the car didn't do exactly the same thing again. We decided to go have some lunch then get the thing home and talk to the garage on Monday.
brainstorming it with son and daughter and son-in-law later we decided that it has to be something to do with the cooling system because Mr M assured me that what it did by losing vrooom and allowing us to pootle along in first gear was something called "limp mode"
I know, it sounds kind of vaguely like we ought to snigger when we say it but it's not that sort of limp apparently, it is the lame kind of limp.
I have been informed by those who know these things that with electronic acceleration (and who knew we had such new fangled shi stuff in our car) if things get overheated then the vroom cuts out so it could be either the thermostat is not working or the water pump. Mr M has his fingers crossed for the thermostat
The rest of the weekend was quiet. I knitted and unknitted the same piece four times before I got it right and I did manage to get the uniforms for youngest son washed and dried.
The car goes to the garage on Wednesday and should be back on Thursday - Mr Ms shifts get in the way of collecting it any sooner and then who knows, perhaps we can try for that picture again. It will be worth it

That's me on Monday Tuesday 

Me on Monday - meals on wheels

It was a nip out to take the tetrapacks to the tip and buy birdseed and find nice yarn instead, a let's get fish and chips and take it to the Bluefunnels for dinner because Lady B is incapacitated, put two loads of washing on the line and stare in amazement as rain falls like (as we say around here) stair-rods, a let's get the tomatoes watered even though said stair-rods should have been enough, a "Mum remind me to buy milk" "we have a cows nest in the fridge so take two from there" kind of a weekend.

Mr M suggested that we should take the bagful of tetrapacks to the tip before they do him permanent damage. The bag hangs on the side of the cupboard and as it fills it sticks out enough to catch his shoulder every time he goes to the bathroom downstairs. I don't notice it as it is over my head. He added that we could go to "Buyology" where they always have stuff we desperately need and get a bag of seed for the wild birds. So we picked up the bag and off we went. We remembered to take the used batteries too. Buyology only had peanuts. Sparrows don't really care for peanuts, the last big bag we bought went mouldy. we moved on and I managed to get anoth contender for 6. A Metal Bridge in the Summertime Scavenger Hunt - our lovely Transporter Bridge.
We had arranged with Lord and Lady B that we would pick up Fish and Chips and take it up to their eirie because Lady be had a new knee just two weeks ago and while her recovery is happening it is not going as quickly as she had scheduled. Lady B cannot bear to be idle so the enforced rest is driving her insane and yet her trauma to her body is not going away even though she has shouted at it. I am sure that she thought she would be able to cope with the pain without the major league pain-killers and now feels she has failed because she has to take them. I have probably said this before when talking about Lord and Lady B but as an only child Lord B was and is the closest I have to a baby brother and when he first brought the girl who was to become his wife to meet us we found an instant connection that has continued for the rest of our lives. We are not the same, oh no but we think the same thoughts and laugh at the same things and if I called her and said "I need you" she would keep me on the phone while she was running for the car - new knee or not.

I put the washing on the line while Mr M did a grocery shop on Sunday and I was so proud of myself for getting two loads of washing out onto the line. As he returned with all the bags of groceries the heavens opened and dumped a river onto the road outside the front door.
Later that evening I went down to see if anything was dry enough to bring in and on checking the tomato plants I discovered that they were really dry.
My daughter popped in on her way to play tennis with Miss Boo and mentioned that she would have to buy milk. For some reason we haven't used as much as usual so I told her to take a couple of bottles from the cows nest - there were 11 pints of milk in there and only the two of us this weekend.

So that was me on Monday. This was invented by Sian at FromHighInTheSky so why not pop over there now that you've read this.