However, it's turned FREEZING (as it always does in February, it's not unusual). What is unusual is that the weather forecast is lying. Today I am wearing socks (unheard of), a jumper and one of my 'dead bear fleeces' and my insides are still shivering. I looked at the forecast and it tells me it's 7 degrees. IT LIES!!! It can't possibly be that 'warm'.
I have continued to arrange things for husband and I to do to get us out of the house. For valentines I've purchased him a session on learning how to fly owls (sorry if I told you this before), I've no idea if he wants to learn to fly owls. When he opens the present I suspect he'll not be sure if he wants to learn to fly owls either. But it's something that we haven't done before - so something new is something good.... hopefully.
We also purchased tickets to a band for December, it's a long wait, but not as long as husband's Christmas present this year, that was tickets for Rob Becket in February 2026. It had better be worth the wait. Anyway, back to the band - one of the good things about being old is that the bands that used to be huge when we were young and alive are now doing intimate gigs in small local venues. So in December I managed to get tickets for Black Grape (who husband loves) who are being supported by Dodgy (who I love). What's more the ticket's became free at 10:00 on 31st January and I completely forgot about it until quite late in the day, and there was still no problem getting tickets.
This may well be because when I excitedly told my colleagues I had tickets, none of them had a clue who I was talking about. Though one person did know because the people in it had been in 'I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here'. I was so appalled they had been on that I almost asked for my money back. It really comes to something when the 'hell raisers' of 'our day' are now doing reality shows. That said I grew up liking the Sex Pistols, but was young enough (then) to look at the band and think that they were actually a bunch of sad losers, who thought they were cool. Now John Lyton is doing butter adverts - well at least he was, but he's not even doing that now.
But what is the waste of a bra about (I hear you cry)..... well.....
Saturday was the day my friends came over for supper - I mentioned that it's one day a month this year, rather than every week and this has had a huge positive impact on me already. One of them (my friend's son) was celebrating his 12th Birthday - well it's later in the month anyway. So we had a party - including party food and pin the tail on the donkey.
To help him start budgeting I'd told him that we would spend £40 on him, but if it was one big thing that was worthwhile we'd go up as far as £50 (we've been close to him since birth, so I treat him as my own). I told him to go and find what he wanted and let me know. Needless to say all he heard were the words £50. About a week later I got his shopping list. He'd spent considerable time finding the cheapest location for all the tut he wanted. Unfortunately he hadn't calculated batteries or postage. In the end I decided not to get batteries and the total bill still came to £58. In addition that wasn't for one item, it was for 3 and all of them were nonsense. I explained to him that we would get the items this time, but I was going to claw back the money in other ways.
So in the end he got a free birthday card, recycled packaging, I spent considerably less on party food than I would do normally and his birthday cake was about 1/3 of the price of what I'd normally spend. I think by the end of it all I actually came out with a profit from what it would have normally cost. Yay! But I'll be much stricter on him next time. A life lesson was learnt this time, I hope. I certainly had a chat with him about future expectations.
On Sunday I went to see one of my bezzies. The one that I travel to Glasgow with. For one reason or another her life has turned upside down since Christmas. I was chatting to her on WhatsApp during the week and we agreed to meet up on Sunday for lunch and a natter. In the end Sunday morning was very chaotic. I looked out of the window at 08:00, still in my nightclothes and the builder was pulling up ready to start work on the wall that blew over in the storm.
I wasn't going to answer the door in my PJ's....again (I did have to answer the door in my PJ's to the person that dropped off the bricks on Friday). So I belted upstairs, grabbed some clothes and got dressed in approximately 3 minutes. It would have been 2 minutes, but because I was seeing a friend I decided to put a bra on - being posh and all that. Because I work from home and people only see me from the shoulders down I rarely wear a bra - unless I'm wearing lighter colours. Most of the time I wear black and it's really not obvious at all (I hope).
I went down to chat to the builders and sort them out with water, then then asked for electricity. I went into the garage to find the extension lead, but couldn't find it anywhere. I was hunting high and low. I was getting moodier and moodier, here I was organising everything whilst husband and son were still fast asleep in bed. My head filled with grumpy thoughts and arguments I eventually spotted the extension lead and helped the builder get setup.
After this I took the dog for a walk because I was pretty sure nobody else would if I wasn't around for the day (I did warn you my head was full of grumpy thoughts - I didn't say they were inaccurate grumpy thoughts though). Once back from the walk I made the lunch to take to my friend. Something simple, a chicken ceasar salad (yum).
Once done I headed off for friends house, in a better mood now. Especially as I had my Wonka CD to sing along to as I went. Traffic to get onto the A23 was horrific, I decided to go past the first junction because it was a sunny day and after the January payday (hoorah for the January pay day). It makes it impossible to join because all the traffic queuing to get into Brighton blocks the rabbit roundabout so the queue ends up on the A27 as well. So I drove up to Hove with a view to going around the roundabout to head back in the opposite direction, a way of avoiding the queue at Rabbit roundabout.
I wasn't concentrating properly and managed to get up to the roundabout, go around it and end up on the same flipping road I'd started on. I then needed to drive all the way to Woodingdean to turn around there. So by the time I actually hit the A23 I'd been driving for about 25 minutes.
Friend lives in Horsham, the rest of the journey was quite uneventful, though as you get close to Horsham it freaks my head out. It's a journey I've done a million times, but there's been so much building work there nothing looks the same. It was certainly easier to do in daylight than the last time I did it when I was tired, hungover and had travelled all the way from Glasgow.
It was great to see friend, we nattered for hours. She has the most amazing dog - it's huge - it's the same size as my car. It's an Alsatian, you know how they can get as big as a bear - well it's one of those. A really lovely gentle dog though. It was odd because it's behaviours were very similar to my little dog, but when something the size of a bear barks in your face I imagine it would be quite intimidating if you were not a dog lover. Fortunately I am - it's a lovely dog.
Funnily enough friend was also at a point that they wanted to do new things with their life. As they are in a wheelchair it required a bit of thinking. In the end I went to ChatGPT, explained the situation and asked for ideas. It came up with some good ones which I left with friend to think through. One of the ideas sparked thoughts about British Sign Language. Something I've always wanted to learn and turns out so had she. So we've agreed to start the journey together. We've set a target for end of February to have worked out what course we're going to do. I'm quite excited. Plus one of my neighbours is profoundly deaf - so it will be great to do more than just wave at them.
All in all the time with friend was great, we put the world to rights and it was great to see her kids (2 of her beautiful girls, plus one of their boyfriends), pitching in to help her out.
Which is more than I did. She has one of those Quooker taps - that can spew out boiling water - ABSOLUTE NIGHTMARE - honestly you need a degree to get it to work. I literally couldn't work it out. Friend said her dad also struggled and always moans he'll bring a kettle the next time he comes - I'm with her dad on that one. Anyway, I fumbled and flapped around the tap to no avail - then it got locked and wouldn't turn or twist in any direction. Friend was less than impressed
Once again I went to ChatGPT and explained the problem and asked for ideas. Once again ChatGPT gave us the answer to get things moving again. I have to say I'm beginning to wonder how I ever coped without it. If you are involved with ChatGPT please don't turn out to be dodgy - because if they turn it off I think I've actually forgotten how to think for myself. I'll probably go into standby and just be found leaning against a wall, with vacant eyes and drool coming out of my mouth.
But I still haven't explained what the Waste of a Bra is about................. it was quite chilly at friends and I never got around to taking my jacket/coat off. As a result of this nobody had the opportunity to benefit from my wonderfully cupped boobies - looking all smart and bra'd up. Though if they had noticed I'd probably have been appalled anyway (sometimes you just can't win).
Friend and I agreed that we'd catch up more often. I'll make sure that I stick to that - so watch this space.
Oh, and random picture of flower.......... for a week now we've had one very hardy spring flower that has come out and is blooming in the garden. I'm hugely excited - the winter is coming to an end. We're just weeks away.
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