Spring did that thing overnight. When I went to sleep last night all in the garden was still quite neat and there were some lovely blossom and a few shoots.
I woke up this morning and the entire garden had exploded overnight. Everything was 10 times the size and spring had definitely sprung.
Spring is most definitely my favourite time of year, I love that at this time of year you are excited about the summer and everything wakes up and looks so green and shiny.
In England there's also the wonder about whether we'll actually get a summer this year. The last good one (proper summer) was during lockdown, which was actually quite well planned because at least those of us with gardens could stretch out in the warmth of the sun. I appreciate not as joyous for those people without outside spaces. There were many different journeys during lockdown, I hold my hands up and say that mine was joyous. In fact because I know that there were so many struggles elsewhere I am careful not to moan about the mental health rollercoaster it caused in me (read back through the blog if you don't believe me). Rather than than being a family of 4 in a one bedroom flat with no outside space, being isolated or in worst cases losing a loved one.
On the subject of mental health, mine took a bit of a knock this morning. Not the worst thing in the world and I'm already over it. I don't consider myself vain, far from it - but about 2 months ago I caught myself in the mirror first thing and I looked like droopy dog. My entire face had fallen. I've invested in a whole stack of red light therapy devices (and a huge cost!) I've been using them religiously for about 2 months now and I felt I saw a real improvement.
This morning I woke up early and decided to take dog out for an early run. I went for a nearby valley where the seagulls sleep at night. The dog loves to run through the seagulls as they scatter on either sides. I know this sounds cruel, but the seagulls around here carry flick knives and fly off with small dogs - oh and attack tourists if they are silly enough to purchase chips. I have little symapthy.
Arriving at the valley it seemed that the sea must be calm because the seagulls were not sleeping inland. so dog and I went for a walk. It was lovely actually - nobody around because it was so early.
Getting back in the car (it's a short 5 minute drive to the valley) the early morning sun caught me full face, just as I was visible in the rear view mirror. It looked like something from a horror show. The bright light demonstrated that none of my work had made any difference at all.
I've now spent huge amounts of money on bits of kit that don't appear to work. I do wonder what it would have looked like if I hadn't spent the last 2 months on red light therapy. I should forget that fact, but given I've spent so much I need to cling to that hope!
On Friday I met up with a friend (son's godfather), they live reasonably close, but we're both rubbish at keeping in touch. It was actually really lovely to catch up with them.
Sunday was Easter and we enjoyed a family roast. Not much to say about this except by 15:00 I had the sleeps and was struggling to keep my eyes open. I've obviously got to that age when you fall asleep after a good Sunday lunch. In fact staying awake was such a struggle for a brief moment I was worried I was having a stroke I felt so odd. Then shortly after that I woke up - so I obviously blinked and fell asleep.
Monday I went through my wardrobe and viciously cut down the amount of clothes I have. 4 bin bags of things. Some of which I've worn recently. The problem with getting older is that the clothes never seem to fall apart. So every time you buy something new you're just adding to a pile of clothes that are already too large.
I then spent the rest of Monday driving around to try to find a clothes recycling bin that wasn't full because everybody else has had the same idea. In fact I had an extremely unsuccessful trip to Asda in Brighton Marina. All the recycling bins near to me were full and I then remembered there were some in the Marina as well as a key cutting place. I need a new back gate key as I think the main key got lost when the wall fell down. I suspect it was scooped up and thrown away.
Having driven all the way to the Marina I was none too pleased to discover the key cutting people didn't have the right key and that the recycling bins there were also full. So drove home having succeeded in nothing except using up my time and spending money on petrol.
In August I'm meeting up with some friends to help celebrate one of my friends 'big' birthdays. Originally we were off to Goodwood for a sophisticated day fine dining and watching the races. Somehow that didn't work out and now we are off to a cabaret/drag queen club in Brighton. I'm not quite sure how the switch happened, but it did!
Both my husband and I work from home and obviously son lives with us. We are lucky enough to have plenty of rooms in the house, but because of the home offices that doesn't extend to lots of spare rooms. In my office I have a sofa bed and there is literally just enough room to put it down for guests, but it's not an amazingly comfortable night for them and there's not much room for their stuff.
Whilst it would be possible for another friend to kip on the sofa one of my friends is in a wheelchair. This means that they couldn't navigate the study for the sofa bed (if they could make it up the 3 flights of stairs) and it wouldn't be appropriate for them to sleep on the sofa.
As a result we decided to book a hotel. Have you any idea how expensive it is to book a hotel room in Brighton in August. Well if you don't - the answer is VERY. We started off looking at 3 rooms and it was going to be about £700. So in the end we booked 2 rooms (I'll share with one of my friends and the other room can go to the friend in a wheelchair). We then ended up spending around 2 hours trying to find the best prices. There were some cheaper Airbnb's, but with a friend in a wheelchair you really need to be sure that the locations are accessible.
In the end we found the cheapest price, but that was still £335.12 for 2 rooms for one night. Given that the cabaret we are off to closes at 10pm and the price of the cabaret includes bottomless cocktails (I envisage carnage!) I don't think we're going to see much of the room at all. So that's a lot of money for a few hours. It didn't even include breakfast.
It's going to feel extremely odd staying in Brighton in a hotel, so close to home. What will be stranger is when we finish for the day and I just take a bus home after a big night out and a hotel!
Aanyway, that's it for this week. We'll catch up again next week.
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