Walking the dog.

I don't mind walking the dog, I don't mind walking the dog in bad weather. I'm a believer in "There is no such thing as bad weather, just the wrong clothes". Especially here in the U.K. where we rarely suffer from real extremes of bad weather.

What does drive me up the wall, however, is constantly having to open the front door so Beano can check if it is really raining! And if so why can't I stop it raining.

I've just returned from a dog walk and my neighbouring cat lady is stood in the rain trying to persuade her car to go inside before it catches a chill. I usually refer to her cat as Greebo, after Nanny Ogg's cat in Sir Terry Pratchett's books. It's a huge black and white tom cat with an evil expression. Beano is scared of the cat and rushes past it with his eyes averted. But like Nanny Ogg,  the lady still sees her cat as a timid little kitten.

I've ordered a sign.

It's mad I know, but I've ordered a sign for when I move.

It's a slate house sign and on it, it will say Cuckoo's Rest.

It will take a while to arrive, but I've decided that when I move, that will be the name of my new home.

The reason behind the name is that my daughter's children call me Cuckoo, many of them have grandparents so although I consider them grandchildren I don't expect them to call me grandma or anything similar. My daughter came up with the name Cuckoo originally as a lot of people think I'm weird.

Tippity tap, tippity tap.

Ye gods!

Steve has developed tippity tapinitis.

He sits and taps his feet continuously all evening. I'm ready to nail his feet to the floor with ten inch nails.

I'm still waiting to have my moving date confirmed, estate agents, mortgage advisors and solicitors all seem to take their time. All I can do is keep buggering on, it will happen eventually.

I've purchased an assortment of items ready for when I move, just small things, a potato peeler and a tin opener etc.

I'm slowly collecting items from around the flat and stashing them in the bag in my wardrobe. I'm also ordering some tinned food and dried pulses with the weekly supermarket delivery, these are also hidden in my wardrobe. I do pay for my shopping so I'm not expecting Steve to pay for them.

I will change supermarkets when I move so Steve won't have my new address and as it will be near Christmas I may not be able to get a delivery immediately. This is why I'm stocking up now. There is a local milkman who delivers to the area so I can order stuff from him.

I don't think there is a cooker there either of that is so I will buy an air fryer and a stand alone single ring to  cook on.

More shopping.

My son has dropped the furniture he's giving me at my daughter's house. This means I now know what size bed I have, a standard double, so I've ordered bedding for it.

Steve went out this morning and didn't get back until 4:30, he rushed straight over to the summer house to ensure I hadn't had too much fun in his absence.

I went over at 3 o'clock and left just before Steve arrived back, I usually only stay for a very short time as, when Steve is there I can't talk to anybody as he talks over me. It was so nice to chat to people, I don't cope well with isolation. 

I've not been feeling very well for the last week or so but there are a few social activities I can join in with when I move. I think it will do me good moving to somewhere where I can have some sort of social life.

Some in some out.

This morning I visited a local  charity shop, I was surprised that Steve let me go on my own.

I took some clothes that I no longer wear and bought some things for when I move.

I bought a craft kit of crochet Christmas baubles on a string, I also bought a bag of assorted baubles in an mixture of colours. I bought a black dress to wear to Betty's funeral, a set of four table mats, three dessert spoons and two china tea plates.

Steve has agreed that I can take half the cutlery and crockery etc but we only have three tea plates and  three dessert spoons so I bought some extra.

When I returned home Steve was stood with Beano waiting for me at the bus stop. He wasn't happy that I'd taken so long, nemmind!

Random ramblings

As I was walking Beano through the park y'day I noticed the ground was littered with twigs and branches that had blown from the trees.

When we lived on the boat we had a wood burning stove to heat it. When I walked Beano I used to collect the twigs as kindling and the bigger branches to use as fuel. Upon my return towards the our boat I would look for boat where there was already wood stacked for fuel and leave what I had collected beside that boat. There was no point me taking it to our boat as Steve refused to use collected wood in our wood burner, he considered it to be dirty and would only use wood he had purchased from a marina!

I keep seeing adverts for dog beds, all sorts of dog beds and occasionally I am tempted to buy one. Then I look at Beano, he is either asleep beside me on the sofa or if I'm in bed he's asleep on the pillow. There would be little point in buying him  a bed. I am however considering buying him a set of steps to enable him to get on the sofa and bed as he's getting older now an less nimble.

Having said that, its cold this morning and everywhere is white with frost. Beano loves frosty mornings and so we had a double length walk at double quick speed, we galloped along the whole way round.

Parsnips at last.

During the summer I have a salad for lunch most days, during the winter I prefer soup, home made soup. 

Sometimes I make soup to a specific recipe sometimes I make fridge debris soup. For the last three weeks I've had a yearning for some curried parsnip soup.

For the last three weeks I've added parsnips to our supermarket delivery, unfortunately for two weeks no parsnips arrived.

I just assumed they'd been missed that is until Thursday when out supermarket delivery arrived. I was in the kitchen putting some of it away when Steve walked in grimacing and waving a bag of parsnips.

He's noticed them on the previous orders and cancelled them as he does eat vegetables and so couldn't understand why I'd buy them. I explained my yearning for curried parsnips soup Steve pulled a face and announced that I should have bought tinned parsnips soup rather than waste time making it.

And that attitude is just one of the reasons I'm leaving!