Back

Finally I am back

My laptop has been away for repair for 3 days which ended up being a couple of weeks. It is now almost virus free and after having windows reinstalled it is faster and cleaner. I haven't really missed it too much. I have been using JA's old desk top which doesn't let me do much but at least I could check my emails and go onto facebook to get my fix of bejewelled the game I play a lot.

I have recently got back into reading books, something I have not done much of in the last couple of years. I'm averaging one every week at the moment compared with one a year which is what I had been managing before.

I don't have anything exciting to tell you. There have been no dates to tell you about. No great social events to describe. My life has been a tad monotonous in that I go to work then go home.

I did drive upto Gloucestershire with my mother for a short visit to my grandmother a few weekends ago. She will be 91 on 27th December, although she is getting frail she still lives alone in the home she shared with my grandfather before he died at the start of 1994. When I last saw her in April I found it very difficult as she had problems with remembering names not just people but places and things too. Since then she has been assessed and is now on medication which has helped her a great deal, she doesn't get so confused and can now say names (even if she does get her sister and daughter muddled).

This time next week my boys will be home from Uni after their first term away. DC ran out of money a couple of weeks ago but OJ has managed his money much better. On Thursday he is getting the train home and we are going back to his college for awards night where he will be getting an award for his A level Law. Afterwards he will go back to Uni which finishes on friday then I will go up there to collect him and his belongings on Saturday. I can't believe it has been a whole term already, we have hardly had time to miss them as they have both been home a few times.

A couple of weeks ago I had my last oncology check up and have now been discharged after 8 years. I have also had a couple of audiology appointments and on 23rd December I should receive my new digital hearing aid. This is being tailor made to my specific hearing unlike my old hearing aid which just amplifies everything. The result being that I hear every noise around me clearly but still struggle with voices especially those people with low voices.

To blog or not to blog

I am not sure how much longer I shall continue to blog. In the last year I have seen many of my blogger friends give up blogging. Whilst I am still here I don't blog anything like as much as I have done in the past. Days and sometimes even weeks go by before it even occurs to me to visit blogs. Now that is not how it was, there was a long time when I was visiting blogs several times a day not only to read new posts but to keep up with the comments too.

I think I have changed in the last few years since I began blogging. whether I realised it or not I used blogging as a kind of validation. friends leaving comments meant that people liked reading what I wrote. That made me feel good inside. But now I don't need other people to make me feel good. I feel more confident more worthy without the validation of others. Therefore I write less frequently, which in turn means that less people bother to read my blog and even fewer bother to leave comments. In the past I would have found this hard, but right now I am feeling good about myself and don't need the validation so much.

However I am glad that I have been blogging for the last 3 or is it 4 years as I have made some good friends and I shall stay in touch with those that I can even without a blog. If I don't have your email address and you would like to stay in touch, if I do give up blogging which is by no means certain at this moment in time please feel free to email me at ladyinred62@hotmail.co.uk.

In the last six months I have been feeling closer to my sons than I had been for a long time. We have always had a close bond but now I feel even closer to them even those who are not here. OJ turned 19 on Thursday and returned home on friday, his first trip home by train. I collected him from the station and we joined my mother and friend at a rotary club evening. My boys have been to several rotary quizzes and murder mystery evenings, this one was 'call my bluff'. The panel were brilliant, the food was provided by a local Spanish Restaurant (selection of tapas which I have never tried before). Next weekend I am being taken to a Spanish restaurant (I am wondering if it will be the same one) by a friend of the restauranteur.

I had been feeling on top of the world on Friday until about mid afternoon when a niggly pain in my temple started. For me this meant that although I enjoyed the evening I had difficulty keeping my concentration (especially as I had my back to the stage and had to turn right round). I found myself people watching whilst I half listened to the hilarious (but seriously delivered) definitions of the strangest of words. Being a rotary evening as I would expect the average age of those in attendance were 20 or 30 years my senior. I did notice though how much these people were all enjoying not only the entertainment and each other's company but the food and drink (there are always copious amounts of wine drunk at these events). I noticed that these men and women, mostly retired professionals know how to enjoy life (many are still children at heart giggling and telling jokes). Their lives are so very different from mine, but it made me realise that growing older doesn't mean we have to stop enjoying life. The pace of life might slow down a little but it doesn't have to stop. I hope that I am enjoying life like they do in 20 years time.

googlemail

I have been having a battle with googlemail.

I have two googlemail accounts (I won't go into the whys now).

There is the one that I set up several years ago when I opened my first blog on blogger. I very rarely look at it or use it in any way other than it allows me to use blogger. For most of the last couple of years I even forgot that I have such an account. Then for reasons of privacy I set up a new googlemail account to use for email without involving my usual email accounts that show my name.

Having opened this new account I either forgot the password or some other such device as I couldn't access the account for a few months. About a month ago when I was playing around with things on my laptop I managed to access my new google a/c. I answered the few emails that were gathering dust there. Got a few replies and have since kept this account live.

However this is having an adverse effect on my blogging. I read one of my favourite blogs, write a comment try to publish the comment only to discover that even though my computer has been turned off I am still logged into the wrong account. I lose the comment I was leaving,while I try in vain to switch accounts. The option to switch never ever works. This even happens on my own blog. So if you have been wondering why I have not been visiting you, I have, I have even tried to leave comments but to no avail. All I can do is go into the googlemail sign out and try again.

Having spent a couple of years not having to sign out of googlemail every time I turn off my computer, I am finding it hard to remember to do this now.

When is a joke not a joke

I would like to let my friends know that I appreciate their concern really I do.

But my last post was meant to be a light hearted one following the previous few that had been full of agony and feeling old. Obviously my attempt to be light hearted and make a few tongue in cheek jokes ie about checking my phone have back fired. I promise I wont do it again!

I appreciate that the written word doesn't always allow the reader to see that the writer is not being serious in everything they write but I did think my friends would recognise my sense of humour. I know my sense of humour passes some people by but then I guess I am sometimes deaf to the humour of others.

So I guess that sometimes a joke is not a joke to those who read it.

My motto for a long time has been ...............A day without laughter is a day wasted.

Blogging by proxy

In the end I was only without the internet for about 36 hours as I was at work when it went off. But during the time without it I have played far too many games of spider solitaire and won precious few I might add. I have listened to music, watched tv including a few Nicholas Cage films

Monday night I went shopping at Asda as DC had given me some cash. 20 minutes after arriving at the store I had finished gathering up the bits I needed to get us through the days upto xmas day. 20 minutes to shop but 35 queueing just to get to the checkout. Having left home at 9pm I got back home at 10.30 for just £25 worth of shopping!!!

Tuesday evening more spider, more tv, then just before midnight the text began,

'are you awake'

Then the phone calls began. it was LV he had read my blog and wanted to chat.
During our chat LV decided to read the coments on my blog to me. That was so funny hearing someone else reading my blog and the comments down the phone to me. But if I thought that was funny it was nothing to listening to him reading other blogs out to me so that I wouldn't miss out. All these blogs were ones that he doesn't usually read. Which made it all the more hilarious. We didn't stop talking until 2am then my alarm went off at 6am, by 8am I had paid my phone bill and gone back to Asda which was not particularly busy neither was the town centre where I went next. so here I am back home and back online. Just about to fall asleep before I start reading blogs.

Have a great christmas everyone

Quiet Lady

Sorry I have been a bad blogger

In the last couple of weeks life has got in the way of blogging. Mostly that has been due to falling asleep but that also includes apathy. Not rushing to my blog to write a post or reply to comments. I think a lot of it is just being very tired all the time. I do read and appreciate the comments left here but just don't have the energy or the words to reply. I have not even been to visit all my favourite blogs, don't ask me why because I don't know the answer.

I am writing this quick post now mainly because I am off out again tonight for another wedding. So that is one funeral and two weddings in 8 days.

I am I guess feeling down because I have not heard from Romeo (his last text sunday before last telling me he was thinking about me). I am not worried or fretting that there is anything wrong between us. I am quite confident on that score. But I miss him so much. I have been through the various stages of being frantic that a day then two passed with no word, the need to be in contact everyday. The anxiety of how often should I text email him when I am getting no response. I am now in the calm space where I just wait th here from him, I am not constantly checking my phone or email. But in the evenings I find myself gazing at his picture willing him to be in contact. I open my phone to send him a text but have nothing to say. There are only so many times/ways of texting 'I miss you' without being like a broken record. I feel sad, alone, unloved, distant. But I know that when he returns he will let me know hes back and it will be as though this distance never was.

I am busy at work and tired at home, I am not just sitting around moping. When I have caught up with sleep and have the energy I am going to crack on with more writing. Anyway, I am still here just being quiet in the corner where I am not intruding on the world. Give me a few days and I shall bounce back all bright and breezy as usual.

Just a quiet day

After the last two days I have spent most of Saturday just trying to catch up on some sleep. I have not slept properly all week. Each time I feel exhaustion sweep over me the coughing starts until I am doubled over with tears streaming down my face. This means that for night after night I ahve been awake at 1am, 2am etc. Friday night I didn't fall asleep properly until around 4am, which meant that when the day began I felt dreadful.

I have spent much of my day (apart from when I was shopping and buying a train season ticket for ET) sitting on my bed with my laptop just surfing, falling asleep in the middle of reading blogs. So if anyone's stats show that I have been sat on their blog for hours on end I wasn't stalking you I was drifting in and out of sleep, hence I have left very few comments anywhere today.

Now I need to go empty the tumbledryer and iron the clothes I need for the next two days. In the morning I shall be going off to Norfolk for The Wedding so I won't be on here again until Monday afternoon/evening.

A week

A week ago I hadn't met Romeo
A week ago I didn't know I was about to meet Romeo
A week ago I was chatting online and falling asleep with my computer
A week ago I had good intentions of going to the gym and doing lots of spreadsheets for work
A week ago I was concerned that Romeo might reject me when we met

In the early hours of Saturday we chatted
In the early hours of Saturday we made a date
In the early hours of Saturday I fell asleep wearing a big grin

On saturday I made plans
On saturday I made purchases
On Saturday my world was rosy

On sunday I made preparations
On Sunday I made an impression on Romeo
On sunday I made out with Romeo for hours in a hotel room

On Monday I grinned a lot
On Monday I smiled all through my day
On Monday I exchanged text with my sweetheart

On Tuesday I yearned for his touch
On Tuesday I was still exhausted
On Tuesday I fell asleep with my laptop

On Wednesday I began a post on Battle
On Wednesday I witnessed a cut throat battle of the teams for promotion
On Wednesday I fell asleep exhausted again

On Thursday I received my first commission payment
On Thursday I parent sat my mother after her knee op
On Thursday Romeo asked me to keep him in my mind

On Friday I finally finished paying my 2007 Council Tax
On Friday I finally published this post
On Friday I am missing Romeo already

getting motivated

I have been meaning to say for a few days now that it has been lovely this last week to not only drive to work in the almost daylight but it is also not quite dark by the time I get home at the end of the day. On wednesday I left work on time for a change (I nearly always end up working most if not all the half hour I am meant to miss as I only take a half hour for lunch). Anyway as I was saying I left work at 4.30pm as I am meant to do every day as it was ET's parent's evening. The sun hadn't set and the sky was beautiful with thepale blue tinged with pink in the west. As I drove along the motorway the chalk cliffs on my right were washed with pink too which was a wonderful and cheering sight. when I finally reached my town I noticed that a couple of the trees in one road were already heavy with floating white blossoms. The daffodils in my garden are beginning to open and the glorious sun we have been blessed with this week makes me realise that spring is just around the corner.

Those of you who read Vi will already know about the blog book which some of our fellow bloggers have been working on. This book is to be a collection of stories by bloggers about their lives and all profits are going to charity namely War Child. I have said that I would submit a story for this book, however I have as yet to decide which event/period of my life to write about I have only until 29th february to get my story in. does anyone have any suggestions given what you know about me.

I have been promising myself that I shall get myself back into my studying. For those of you who are not aware of this I began a course in IT skills for commerce last year. I began well but then became poorly and din't have the energy or the inclination to study much. ten I began working again which cut down the amount of time I had to use the computer as this meant I now had to share my time with the boys. Internet and various other pc related problems over the months didn't help. Now I am working full time I find I am too tired for anything serious. But now the days are getting longer and I am feeling more awake I have given myself a proverbial kick up the ass to get on with this course especially as I am still paying for it and it isn't cheap. So over the last week or so I have been rereading my latest chapter reading for submitting my next Tutor Marked Assignment. finally I have managed to get onto the Student Website.......I could never get my password to work before but my new one I requested is fine.

the other evening I was having a chat on msn with Hector. The conversation got around to growing up or not.

I hope this doesn't mean I shall start to grow up

nooooo but depends what ya want to

nah I don't think I'll bother

growing up hahaha

no don't wanna do that

no be silly and daft and girly

do you think I can manage that?

ya not far off ya like being a tomboy but deep down your really a girly and sweet just not given the right attention at times but yer def daft and silly :-)

I like that description.........I think he has got me to a T

its good

This week is continuing to be good

I had intended to write about whats going on but I ahve been so tired tonight that it is now too late so I shall have to fill you in tomorrow.

In the meantime just know that life is good even if it is tiring

Pixie I am thinking about you and keeping my fingers crossed

Vi I am glad things are going well for you the same for Emma

Cat I hope things improve for you soon

Innocent I am glad you have cheered up

everyone else I just hope life is treating you well right now and I shall get round to commenting on your blogs again soon if I havent already.

love to you all

oh and Pete hope you start feeling better soon xx