dear diary :: here, there and everywhere

What should have been a calm day yesterday spent packing and preparing turned into a bit of a frenzy.

The morning began with a little blogging, a little ironing and I also stripped the bed completely (mattress protector included) and put the washer on to make the most of the warm weather. So far so good…..

I was busy working slowly down the task list and making a pile of the clothes to take with us on our spare room bed when suddenly a car drew up outside and who should get out but our dear old friend Uncle Crisp (our daughter’s nickname for him not ours and who was best man at our wedding). He was on his way back up to Skye and thought he would drop in to see us. It was lovely that he did and we caught up on news and old times.

Then elder daughter appeared with little Freddie too.

As you can imagine from this point on not a lot got done. Uncle Crisp left and we had a late lunch and then DH and I went off to town for his dental appointment to replace an old filling. Afterwards we had to look for new slippers and some casual shoes / trainers for DH. It is usual that he leaves this kind of shopping to the last minute. He is no shopper. In fact he sees nothing wrong with his old trainers – he has had them for years, they are comfortable, well worn in and serve the purpose – but look to me like they need to go in the bin!

Two hours later with a renewed filling, new slippers and new trainers we came back home. But not much packing had got done.

However, the washing was dry.

But we both had a senior moment and forgot to remember to go for petrol – as we have a Sainsbury’s coupon to use for 10p off a litre and need a full tank to go to Scotland..

To add to my frenzy the blood envelope that was supposedly posted out to me last Friday (but had a post mark of Monday) arrived with the postman during the afternoon – far too late to consider going over to Leeds to have the blood taken. I had mentioned to them the urgency as we were going away but it never really registers! I need to have the blood taken before my holiday for the consultant’s appointment the day after we get back.

So all in all a strange day full of interuptions and as a consequence we are having to rethink our course of action and possibly delay our trip up to Scotland by a day as I feel otherwise we will be leaving here with a lot of loose ends that I haven’t managed to sort yet and that for me would be more stressful than having a day less holiday.

And I have still to work out just when we go over to Leeds for my blood tests. Life can feel like it is working against you some days.

To top it all it was green bin night – DH has a mental block over this since they moved it from Monday night to Wednesday night. Luckily I remembered in time so he wouldn’t have to go chasing after them with the wheelie bin in the morning.

Today should be a quieter day for me to finish the packing, clean round the house and move the pots in the garden out of the full sun. As everyone now thinks we will have left for Scotland we shouldn’t have any unexpected interuptions.

We will have to have my bloods done and get the petrol en route to Scotland tomorrow I think, unless we can get over to Leeds this afternoon. Although Leeds is only about 18 miles away St James hospital is out on the other side to us and it can take us up to 2 hours to get there depending on the traffic and the M62.

It is warm and sunny here today but with a strong cool breeze – I was hoping for a little rain overnight to fill up the water butt ready for our hand over to the neighbours to do the watering should it turn hot, but none came. Another job then for the list (well DH’s list)- to top it up with the hose pipe.

Using Opera browser to access Todoist is brilliant – it produces a clear PDF print of the whole list without all the header and footers cluttering it up. So I am all set with my ‘old fashioned’, non techie paper packing list to finish the packing today and I will feel pleasantly jubilant as I tick off each item.

We have already made nutloaf and soup to take (tick,tick) and over the last year have discovered by trial and error the best meals to make in the caravan using the calor gas oven so I have a little menu plan in my head for these.

So we are almost all set to go – what can go wrong now…..?

I can’t wait to get up there, unpack and flake out……now did I pack those gardening gloves?