It was a simple, beautiful way to come round this morning; the sound of rain on the roof at 6.30am. Much better than the 3am ‘Where am I?’ jerking awake of yesterday. And so, it appears that I’m slipping into Antigua time. 🙂
Beautiful or what?
The last three weeks were hectic. Lovely but hectic. I mean, it was only 16 months since my last move, so I’m not sure how one woman can collect so much stuff. As I’ve wondered before, how did Mother Teresa manage with a bucket and a spare sari? So, there were numerous trips to charity shops to off-load mainly clothes that I’ve either never worn, of have lost all hope of getting back into, overnight miracles of losing three stone in my sleep just ain’t gonna happen!!
And paperwork! We live in an almost paperless society now. I try to do everything on-line, yet some bodies – HMRC and Havering Council, to name but two – insist on sending hard copies, which then get lost in my filing system. (Shove it into a plastic bag and then into a large box which gets put into storage.) I am paranoid about throwing out something that I’m later going to be questioned about, although, logic tells me that if there hasn’t been a query with the gas bill for November 1989 that there probably won’t be by now…
The last three weeks were also one hectic social whirl. Smashing! So many meet ups, lunches, drinks etc with friends and family. Strictly with Auntie J and the Cousins, coffee with M, lunchtime theatre with the Sister, Cousin J and actress J, dinner and theatre with the Daughter – love and miss her so much! – birthday lunch with the Sister and Brother, lunch with the Brother and Nephew the Younger, lunch with J from Dunstable, dinner with J from Thundersley, Personal Shopping afternoon with the Daughter and the Sister, followed by dinner in Knightsbridge with L & L, long phone calls with those I didn’t have time to meet up with and then two chillaxing nights with M in West Sussex, who then very kindly helped me repack my two very large, overweight suitcases and took me to Gatwick on Sunday morning. How empty my life would be without my lovely family and friends!!
The was no upgrade on the flight, in spite of the Captain’s best efforts – I had to travel economy!!! 🙁 The plane was full of BA staff rushing to use their travel concessions before the end of March when they expire. How inconvenient! LOL! BUT, I had 3 seats to myself, which was fantastic and for which I was very, very grateful as it meant I could put my feet up and have a little kip after watching Spectre (not as good as Skyfall IMO) and enjoying a rather nice lunch.
It was my first time into the new VC Bird Airport. I was impressed! There are even luggage trolleys available and you don’t need to put a coin in! The only downer is that you can’t take them outside the airport and so if you have a lot of luggage have to pay for a porter to take them 10 yards.
And so, to Five Islands and Avocado Cottage. S kindly came to meet me at the airport and we went via Epicurean so that I had food and drinks and yesterday was spent settling in. As I said above, I woke up very early as I was still on UK time, and so by late afternoon I was nodding off. It’s been great chatting to people and I’m meeting up with B today for lunch after treating myself to a mani and pedi with the lovely sadie in Jolly Harbour. And it was soooo nice to see the Fella Who’s Far Away again.
I’ve had a FaceTime session with the Daughter – how brilliant is that! Much clearer than Skype, I found. It’s reassuring to know that I can speak to and see her from more than 4000 miles; one of the blessings of technology! It also brought home to me how my parents must have felt when I went to live in Spain aged 18. No mobile phones, no internet. You couldn’t even dial UK direct, you had to go to the local Telefonica office and book an overseas call, which could take up to several hours to come through. Apparently the postcard telling them I’d arrived took 3 weeks to arrive. They must have been worried sick. Wish I could apologise to them for that…
And from tomorrow – WRITING! I now have no excuses for not ploughing ahead and finishing The Banjo. I couldn’t ask for a nicer writing office. 🙂
Shame I didn’t get to see you before you went Elaine. I didn’t realise you were going so soon. Is it a permanent move?
Have a lovely time and good luck with the writing. Xxx
Thanks, Carol. As I said – the last couple of weeks were manic – and you were away yourself, too. Am back at the end of May for a couple of weeks. Hope to see you then xx