New Home

So we moved house on Saturday. Not very far from where we were before, but I reckon moving two people’s furniture and belongings any distance is quite a task! We’ve barely stopped since we moved, and almost have everything unpacked… I was supposed to be doing nights Sunday and Monday, but luckily work was quiet so I managed to get Sunday night off, which meant I didn’t have to spend Sunday afternoon asleep and Sunday night in work, so we had a productive day.

The flat was sold as having two bedrooms with a large kitchen / living space, but we decided we’d prefer to use the bigger bedroom as a living room and the kitchen space for dinning and books etc. So consequently our bedroom is quite small, so we’ve had to re-organise our stuff, so that only bedroom essentials went in the bedroom. It’s quite nice having a whole flat to put things in – I’ve been able to do that before, but not to the same extent because I’ve always lived with other people, aside from Mr B. It just means we’re having to find new homes for everything.

It’s been fairly recently converted (it was the ground floor of a house), and the previous occupier was involved in this process, which I think has helped to ensure the quality. The kitchen is amazing – it has a full length cupboard that pulls out, fancy swingy thing on the corner cupboard for ease of access, a magnetic strip which you can stick knifes to and drawers which close themselves! (I get easily excited… ) There’s also a massive fridge / freezer which is fantastic because it’s all ours, although it’s high pitched squeal if the temperature gets too high inside it, is just slightly annoying… The first time it happened, Mr B had accidently left the fridge door open, and we were both standing in the kitchen trying to work out what that noise was. When we figured it out, we thought it was really cool – a fridge that tells you if it’s not shut properly! But then the next day we went shopping and put lots of warmer things into it, and it wouldn’t shut up for ages…

Yesterday morning I had great fun sorting out all of our books. When I moved in with Mr B he obviously had all his books on his bookcase, and I (mostly) left them where they were. But now all the books had been merged in boxes, I had the ideal opportunity to sort them all out. So they’re now sorted properly by subject and author.

Turn the other cheek?

Somebody has made a very selfish decision which impacts massively on us, and what we do over the next few months. It’s very iritating and makes me almost regret doing what I assumed was the right thing to do. The whole thing has made me really annoyed and frustrated. Last night when I found out the news, I was so annoyed I was starting to think up ways to make his life difficult, as he’s made ours. But then I felt really mean for even thinking those things. And I remembered what Jesus said about turning the other cheek. Easier said than done.

I doubt if I’ll end up doing anything purposefully spiteful in revenge, but right now every time I think about it I boil up with anger, so I can’t even contemplate forgiving him right now. Jesus doesn’t ask for a lot, does he?! Maybe I’ll get there, some day. For now though, I’m going to make sure he knows the facts behind the situation and take it from there.

Odd Socks

Everytime I do any washing I acquire more odd socks. I currently have 13 in my drawer. And it drives me mad! Unless they’re only different on the bottom or underneath the shoe line (like black socks with coloured toes and heels), then I can’t wear them, because it would just annoy me. And so I’m always running low on socks that match! I would buy loads of plain socks, where it didn’t matter whether they matched or not, but I like matching them up, and I like having patterned socks… I keep hoping, with every wash, that the number of remaining odd socks will be significantly reduced. But it never seems to happen! I just don’t know what’s happening to all these socks!

RIP Papa

My Papa (Grandad) holding me as a baby in his back garden. He died peacefully this afternoon.

Here’s to his 89 years of life. Here’s to his 62 years of marriage. Here’s to his contribution in the second world war. Here’s to the two children he lovingly brought up. Here’s to the towns he was postmaster for. Here’s to his four grandchildren and four great-grandchildren, who have always looked up to him.

He had a wonderful life. The only thing I’d change is the last 6 months. But his suffering is over now. RIP Papa.

Photo Problems

I bought a fancy new camera with my birthday money and I enjoyed playing with it when we went to see all the balloons from the Fiesta, as they sored across the sky. I wanted to upload some of them here, but whenever I try to, it comes up with ‘HTTP error’… :S It does it when it’s ‘Crunching’ the image, so I thought that maybe the image is too big for it to crunch properly? Has anyone had a similiar problem?

Happy

So yesterday evening it finally felt like my birthday. Many of my friends from here and a couple from uni, came to have a BBQ at our house. Anna’s present to me was that lovely hand painted banner, you see above, which I’ll be able to use every year now!

For complicated reasons, we were storing an event shelter in our flat, so we decided to make the most of this and put it up in the garden. We then put old rugs and a blanket out on the ground, with our coffee table and cushions on top. Our hammock was also under the shelter, so people enjoyed sitting there, as well as on a few chairs. With the fairy lights, outdoor lanteens and one other lamp when it got dark, it made for a cosy evening. Everybody said they really enjoyed themselves and I know I certainly did!

Facebook

Facebook profiles are normally filled with the latest quiz’s people have taken, or birthday wishes. Shaun’s currently has messages from dozens of friends of comisseration, thanks and RIPs. I somehow wasn’t expect that, and it moved me to tears. Oh, and his wife posted on there too, with the date of his thanksgiving service – next Thursday, my birthday. The day that Shaun so carefully made sure that I still had off, when he was changing my shifts around the other week.

Bike Worship

So it was my turn to lead our alternative evening worship, again. Well no, it was my service partner’s turn to lead (and mine to be a helper), but she was away and nobody else was free to lead it, so I offered. At the time I offered I had a v.free week. This was before my shifts got changed around, and with one thing and another, I suddenly had a v.busy week. When Mr B was looking in my diary last Wednesday and pointed out that I was leading the service on Sunday, it came as a surprise as I didn’t have any time left to plan it!

Given that this week is bike week, our town held a Biggest Bike Ride, and I’ve just finished reading a book about The Man Who Cycled Around the World, I decided to have a bike theme. I’d seen a bike blessing service via Richard a few weeks ago and was inspired, but logistics meant that it wouldn’t be possible to carry out a replica. So I took a different angle – I realised that I connect to God more on a bike than I do in most other places. So I decided to speak about these feelings, through a reflection, and encourage people to think about where they feel they best connect to God. Then people were asked to write this, or something connected to the bike theme, down on a peice of material and tie it onto a bike tyre. Aside from a introductory bike presentation and song, I didn’t really have the time to sort out anything else for the service. So I stuck our candle lighting ‘tradition’ and the Lord’s prayer at the end, and hoped it would be ok.

Everything went wrong. The people with the keys to the church turned up 20 minutes later than expected, giving me 20 minutes less to set up the laptop, projector, music system, chairs, candles, etc. I’d kindly borrowed a friend’s laptop, as Mr B’s is elsewhere and mine can’t cope with ‘high pressure’ situations. This friend was setting up the laptop and projector for me, when it decided it didn’t want to turn on. It would come on, get half way through loading up, and then decide it couldn’t do it, and try again. Not what you want 10 minutes before you need it. Thankfully some bright spark fixed it. Then, at the time the service was supposed to be starting, I realised I didn’t have my copy of the order of service, which I’d typed up and printed before coming out. And then left it on the printer. Doh. I could remember what happens when in the service. The only problem was the reflection I’d written was on that paper, and I couldn’t remember it word for word. I didn’t really have any choice – I just did a short talky bit during which I summarised the reflection. Put that together with the fact that I’d prepared the presentation in Open Office and my friend’s computer only had Microsoft Office, which decided it didn’t like some of the photos and slide timings, then I wasn’t in the most positive frame of mind.

Anyway. I scraped around the problems, and it was kind of ok in the end. The silence during the candle lighting turned out to be surprisingly deep. I’d put it in to add a bit more length the service, but it worked really well. Everyone seemed to be so deeply envolved in the silence, that I didn’t want to interupt it with the Lord’s Prayer. I left it a few more minutes before quietly announcing it, and the well known prayer was said quietly throughout the circle, without a leader or particular version being used, which was nice.

Whilst clearing up I was feeling a bit low about the service – I hadn’t had enough time to prepare, it felt like everything had gone wrong and that it was all a bit too fluffy and vague. Ok, so the silence was deep but that could have been because people were glad that I wasn’t wittering on anymore! But then a friend came up and told me how much it had touched her. She’d been recently talking about how our services should have more space in them, rather than being too busy, and she said she could completely relate to the whole bike thing. I thanked her, and immediately felt better about it. I know it’s a cliche, but the fact that it touched one person made all the last minute stress worthwhile. And next time I’ll try to be more organised…

Ankle (again)

So over our two week holiday, which included a trek across Hadrian’s Wall, my ankle calmed down. Probably more during the week after, but still. Then last Tuesday I went back to work, did a 12 hour shift, and it was back to being really swollen and sore again. Sigh. After another shift and more pain, I got a bit upset about it all, and ended up re-visiting the GP, phoning work to change my shifts to short shifts again and getting an occupational health referral. At the moment I’m still doing 12 hour night shifts, because we don’t do short nights and I can’t stop doing nights without occupational health’s recommendation.

Last Monday, before it all flarred up again, I saw the physio. After an hour and a half meeting, she didn’t know what was definitely wrong, just that it was an inflamatory process which had affected the nerve, but this was likely to be secondary to the initial swelling which was probably from the tendon. She said I had v.good movement in the ankle, and the joint itself was fine. I am though, balancing more on one side of my foot than the other. So she made an heel thing to go inside my shoes, which makes my foot go towards the outside, where it seems to be reluctant to go naturally. She also recommended an exercise which stretches the tendon this way too.

I also complained that my leg, coming up from the sore area, was often stiff, so she recommended gently massaging it to get out any knots. Mr B was massaging it earlier, as he had done several times, and he noticed there was a ridge on the tendon, as it rose above my ankle. It was v.sore when he rubbed it, and having established that this wasn’t normal, we decided to stop massaging it, until I’ve met with the physio again.

It’s been 6 weeks since it initially flared up. And I’m fed up with it. I’m fed up with having to limit the amount that I can stand / walk each day. I’m fed up with having to kick up a fuss at work in order to get the shifts that mean it only swells up a little, instead of lots. I’m fed up with the fact that with short shifts, my days off are rare. I’m fed up with knowing that the more I rest it, the quicker it will get better, but that I simply can’t stop working and stop my life.

Lists and Timetables

Ever since I was old enough to write, I’ve always writen lists. I can remember being about 8 or 9 and writing out lists of everything I had to do in the coming day. And then I’d go back and fill in times beside each item. I would rarely stick to these times – everything would always take longer. But I’d still write them in. By the time I came to do my GCSEs, I had multicoloured timetables written out for the exam period and weeks before. I was slightly better, at this stage, at knowing what I could fit into a day. But I’d still run behind in my timetable and end up rewriting it. At A level I used a similar scheme. I’d spend several hours, planning in great depth which bit of my revision I was going to do when. My Mum used to say the time would be spent more productively actually revising. But, I dunno – I think it was important for me to have it all planned, even if I didn’t stick to it (or maybe I just did it because I liked writing it all out in rainbow colours! – all my revision notes used to be in rainbow colours too!!!!).

I’m still doing the same now. Except I’ve adapted to slightly more high tech versions. All my organisation stuff is on my laptop. When I’m here in my room, for any length of time, I usually have my laptop on, so that I can keep in touch with the outside world. So, it just seemed to make sense to do it on there. At the moment, I have a file in word called ‘To Do!’ and it contains a list of everything that I need to do. Most of it is work stuff, but there’s a few other things, like SCM stuff and random other bits. At the side of each item, I have written when I plan to do it. And then, when I turn on my computer, I open this file, and highlight in bold, all the things that should be done today. When I’ve done them, I have the satistfaction of changing the bullet point from a black circle to a tick. At the moment, I have several things on the list which are half done, so I changed their bullet points to a different symbol. Underneath this list, I have also written out a wider time scale plan. I’ve written the date of my exam, and split the time between now and then up into sections. For each section I have typed out clearly my work objectives for that period. I like doing it on the computer like this, because its easily editable. I can change it easily from day to day. The list is extendable. And if I completely mis-judge how long something will take me, then I don’t have to write out a whole new timetable.

Now, tell me. Is this excessive and silly or organised and sensible??? Those who know me well, will know I like to have things planned. And this is one way that I can. My Dad would never dream of doing anything like this in a million years – I mentioned it to him briefly on the phone, and he just laughed at me!