SALLY....PART 245....UPROAR AT THE DENTIST !

 

"NO ! DON'T TOUCH ANYTHING !" I shouted at an old woman who'd been forced to stand outside for a quarter of an hour after arriving for her appointment far too early, as she pressed the button on the Waiting Room hand gel dispenser which had a boldly printed sign beside it saying, 'Do NOT use this until told to by a member of staff !'

It really does !

She ignored me and used it anyway and none of the reception staff even noticed anything out of the ordinary except for an old man wearing an ancient browning-at-the-edges face mask seemingly suffering from Tourettes !

I eventually got escorted upstairs for my treatment and as one now has to put one's face mask back on after removing it for the dentist to do his work I did as instructed and followed the nurse back downstairs to be let out, or at least started to !

Unfortunately, after seeing the nurse squirt gel one-handed from the dispenser outside the treatment room and thinking that I ought to do the same I pressed up one handedly, as she had done ten seconds before, but instead of a little squirt to cleanse myself the entire body shot upwards and plummeted to the carpet, ejecting its entire contents into a fan shaped disaster zone with the bracket parts that once held it to the wall crashing down beside it !

She angel-like said, "Oh my goodness !" or something similar and I shouted out, "OH FOR GOD'S SAKE HOW DID THAT HAPPEN ?" !

Everyone came running, including my dentist, all expecting to see my body at the bottom of the stairs !

"Oh I'm SO sorry nurse, here let me help you clean it up !" I begged, desperate to make amends !

And she, as calm as calm could be asked me to leave the job to her and ushered me downstairs and saw me out before shutting the door behind me.....quite forcefully I thought at the time !

It was only after I'd made two more calls that I got back in the car and spotted the mountain of gel still sitting on my left shoe and asked God to eradicate what they'd thought they'd seen from the brains of the people in the shops I'd subsequently dealt with and who'd said nothing but HAD backed away from me !

SALLY....PART 244. I GAVE UP LOOKING FOR THE BABY PLUM TOMATOES AND FRIED SOME GRAPES INSTEAD !

YES THOSE ARE GRAPES !

 In the interest of food preservation and storage Shirley hit on a brilliant way to reuse old plastic bread wrappers and frozen fruit bags !

This system works fine for her because HER brain knows what she has put in which and where she has stored the items for extra longevity !

Me ? I haven't got a clue but to help out a bit now that she has a severe cut in a fingertip I took over the washing up whilst we were away this week and even cooked my own breakfast AND chopped up some hefty vegetables to make a perfect soup to boot !

I could just about find the bacon without too much trouble as it was in a virtually transparent extra bread bag although it was slightly hidden under a small tub of Lurpak which she had refilled from a larger one left at home !

Did I mention that the fridge in our static caravan...did I even mention we were staying in our static?...is only high enough for a very small person to see into unless you get down on your knees and frankly even a circus dwarf would also have to get down on her knees to be able to see into it without giving herself backache !

So once the bacon was nicely spitting all over the hob I bent down to get the plum tomatoes that I knew we'd bought and thus started a fruitless search, unwrapping frozen fruit bags containg cheese, humus, onions, cream, radishes and blueberry muffins but no tomatoes !

I stupidly searched the freezer where frozen foods were double wrapped in the cast off bags of totally different foodstuffs and found nothing red and having once repacked the tiny overfilled space in a bad mood and therefore wrong order I stood up with my sciatica killing me and looked in the eight biscuit tins that also really irritate me when I'm looking for a biscuit !

I'd left the gas on too high and the bacon was about to turn into charcoal having spread its fat right across the draining board and turned the remaining oil black when in a temper I opened the bread cupboard and spotted a box of grapes and desperate for something to sweeten the burnt offerings threw a handful into the pan and LO, the tomatoes were sitting by the cooker where I had forgotten I'd put them before I started cooking and so they went in too to be followed by an egg which I managed to fry until it was hard and a piece of bread which I fried to destruction....and jolly nice it all was too !

Anyway when we got home and I unpacked I found this bag of frozen raspberries in the boot and wasn't in the least bit surprised when I looked inside and found two small bottles of water !

NOW WHAT'S IN HERE ?

SALLY...PART 243 ! OK SHE IS BETTER THAN ME !

It's taken fifty years, all but one year, for me to admit that Shirley is superior to me and it took today's game of Scrabble to finally get me to admit it !

I am NOT a stupid man and however badly she's doing she will always come racing past me in her last two or three turns, leaving me inconsolably depressed and her smirking as she answers another twenty or so 'pings' on top of the fifty she's already answered !

Today she didn't wait so long and having cursed me for using all my seven letters not only for the opening go but for the next go too...unheard of really...she then put on her Stormtrooper's boots and got a sevener herself and then JERKS on a triple word !

I know this won't mean a lot to anyone who doesn't play but I am deeply wounded and full of loathing as she wins all but a very few games...but then I do dread it when she IS losing because she can get VERY angry and throw her letter holder at the board and leave me to get my own supper !

LOCKDOWN is ending soon isn't it !

SALLY....PART 242. STOP TALKING RIGHT NOW OR I WILL PUT A KNIFE TO YOUR THROAT !

 

I adore my eleven year old grandson Daniel !

He's a complete genius and seems to genuinely understand quantum and nuclear physics to the point where he can explain it to me as if HE'S 72 and I'M 11 !

His mother has brought her boys up with a full knowledge of the workings of the human body in such an open and honest way which I would never have done and didn't do, waiting for them to ask questions which I then told them to go and ask their mother but as no-one seems to agree with me these days about keeping children as innocent as possible for as long as possible I must be in the wrong....or am I ?

My father was a Doctor and he never had THAT talk with any of his five sons and we all survived happily in complete ignorance of anything above a lady's ankle and so did my sons !

Learning what you needed to know about life behind the bike sheds has served boys well for generations and I don't see why things should change now !

Sadly I never found anyone to take ME behind the bike sheds so my knowledge has remained at ankle height my entire life !

Anyway today I posted this photo of two frogs in an embrace and my daughter showed it to her son without realising it showed frogs having sex !

He said, "Why are you showing me a picture of frogs having sex ?" and she replied, "I don't think they have sex, he just squirts over the eggs !" And HE replied, " Stop talking now or I will put a knife to your throat !"

She's a midwife without an edit button which she might have inherited from me and he's going to grow up weird !

 

SALLY....PART 241. "TROUBLE WITH YOUR OWLS MR. NASH ?"

I must admit that my hearing is not what it was and so when I was asked this morning whether I was having trouble with my owls I had to stop and think about that for a second !

The lady who asked me was speaking from behind her facemask and spoke in a quiet voice heavily laden with Geordie which I might have found hard to understand if she hadn't had a mask on and I could have seen her lips moving !

I looked beeseechingly first at her and then at the ceiling and then at her friend and then back to her before saying, "Owls ? I don't have any and wasn't planning on getting any so why do you ask ?"

Her friend groaned, as did the lady who then spoke louder and clearer to this evidently STUPID old man !

"I said BOWELS MR NASH, BOWELS !"

I then remembered I was lying on an examination bed about to have a CT Colonagraphy treat and tutting in a way I hoped she'd think meant that I was trying to bring humour to my terror replied, "Oh BOWELS ? No but then that's for you to find out isn't it ?"

The next few minutes were not the most pleasant I've ever experienced as enough carbon dioxide to launch several hot air balloons was 'introduced' to an unmentionable part of my body and I went very quiet for quite a while !

SALLY...PART 240....AND SO THE TESTS BEGIN !

 Tomorrow I'm going to have an endoscopy to see what's causing whatever problems I've been having and when I checked the letter this morning I read the word 'Gastrology' and thought that that meant sticking the tube up from the other end so I phoned the ward and said, remarkably sneerily, "Do you know what I'm having tomorrow ?" as if I was talking to an idiot and the receptionist said with genuinely undisgused kindness, the sort reserved for scared ancient idiots, "Yes of course, we are going to have a look down your throat into your stomach." 

"Ah so 'Gastrology' doesn't mean coming up from the other direction ?"

"No it doesn't Jonathan, you're having that next week...a CT Colonoscopy."

Only professionals call me by my real first name as I can't be bothered trying to explain why no-one else calls me by it !

"Right, I was just checking !" I stuttered holding my fist between my teeth to stop myself bursting into tears, "I'll see you tomorrow then!"

And yes I HAD read the enclosed leaflet that described EXACTLY what they would be doing !

Must be nerves then !

SALLY....PART 239. AN HOUR LATER AND I STILL CAN'T FIND THE PITTAS !

 I'm having to cook for myself today because Shirley's reacted a bit to yesterday's jab and taken to her bed...which is no longer our bed because of my snoring so I'm now in the boxroom because were I to sleep in the other main bedroom she says I'd wake the neighbours up !

It's raining too hard to go to the shop to buy some bread so she suggested I had cheese on pitta rather than cheese on toast and that's where today's problems began !

You will barely find an ornament in the house and certainly no collections as Shirley can't stand either BUT she's got a thing about old bread and frozen fruit bags which she saves by the hundred and uses to keep opened packets of other foodstuffs in...including packets of pitta breads !

She said they were in the freezer but I'm now frozen to the bone having had to look inside every reused bag and I still can't find the things !

And now I'm REALLY starving !

GET UP AND COME DOWN....PLEASE ! 

POST SCRIPT....Shirley DID get up and came down to INSTANTLY put her hands on the pittas which were inside another pitta bag....of course !

And I ended up with some lovely scran that she wouldn't touch !

SALLY....PART 238. IS IT TIME TO WRITE THOSE FINAL LETTERS ?

 "It's all too late and you should have done it before !" I thought to myself when I was sitting in A&E with a cannula in my arm expecting my head and heart block up ort explode,"You should have written each important person in your life a farewell letter !"

But d'you know what, it's several days later and I have done nothing about them and can't bring myself to start so you'll all have to wait until I'm REALLY ill !

SALLY...Part 237. I DON'T KNOW WHOSE TOOTHBRUSH SHIRLEY PACKED ME OFF TO HOSPITAL WITH !

 No doctor has quite worked out what is actually wrong with me in the last many years but stuff like raised blood pressure, gallstones, a hiatus hernia and quite serious life threatening heart conditions have all been investigated and chemicals prescribed which allow me to carry on writing this garbage and make thousands of more purses and more importantly survive to annoy !

Three hours after a particularly large serving of Shirley's beef caserole, roast potatoes, carrots and parsnips which I was too full to finish a suspected stomach ulcer which is YET to be proven saw me in distress with very dreadful breathing problems and a blood pressure reading of 217/117 which was so high that it  required immediate A&E treatment !

So Shirley thrust a toothbrush and a virtually empty tube of toothpaste into my already stuffed coat and didn't cry or appear in any way moved as I was driven off !

Gemma must have thought her father a complete idiot when he asked the receptionist if he could use the toilet before sitting down and I think I must have been pretty much out of it because I can only vaguely remember asking !

Masked up in casualty and with a triage nurse confirming my home monitor reading I was sat in a spacious area that I think might have been especially peopled with nutters to keep me entertained for the three and a half hours I was there amongst and one of them !

No-one spoke, except some of those nutters, jabbering to themselves as I read and re-read a TV screen headline, 'Firm confirms it's sold more vehicles but with less profit this year' as it slid continuously across the bottom of a large screen that also recommended 'STAY IN AND WORK OUT' and permanently showed 'WAITING TIME TWO HOURS' !'

Very little happened; almost no activity took place...a body here and a body there were called and disappeared but no-one new came in once I'd arrived at 10pm !

An overweight elderly man in shorts with a cut knee irritated everyone for two hours until he disappeared by working his way very slowly backwards in the wheelchair he'd been sat in by removing one slipper and sock and using the big toe of his uninjured leg to thrust himself one inch at a time out of the building and then back in again ! I refused to catch his eye as I didn't want another friend for life like so many others I've managed to pick up along the way !

Some sat jiggling up and down and others burst out laughing at nothing whilst black clothed 'SECURITY' officers wandered in and out to go to the toilet or collect a paper cup of coffee from a vending machine off limits to the public !

And so I waited for my arm to be emptied of blood for tests and was sent out to wait again with a canula left inserted in case I collapsed, my mobile phone totally beyond my comprehension lying idle in my lap after I had REALLY tried and failed to connect it to the NHS network so I could keep my unworried sleeping wife up to speed !

I mean, I REALLY tried but I never carry a phone and had NO idea of what my password is, what the maiden name of my mother's favourite aunt's mother-in-law was or which of a hundred 'data sliders' to operate but I now see that it cost me TWO QUID to fail to use the pay as you go monster that I'm forced to carry in case I die and need to phone for help !

I now wish I'd thought about what to wear that would have eased me smoothly through my visit and the tests but I didn't so here's what NOT to wear....A thick coat with stuffed pockets on top of what looks like a road mender's 'gilet', on top of TWO woollen jumpers, on top of a long sleeved Rohan shirt, on top of a T shirt !

Each time I was summed for another test I had to remove everything and the staff must have thought I lived on the streets, especially when stuff started falling out of my pockets and onto the floor.....like the toothbrush I didn't recognise !

"OH GOD !" I thought, "please don't let her have sent me with the one that sits at the far end of the shelf that I use to bleach the taps and clean the plug holes !" and which I didn't need because I got sent home !

And I do believe I heard quite a disappointed sounding hissed, "Oh Bugger !" coming from beneath an upstairs bedroom as I walked back in at 2:06am but I didn't mention it !

SALLY....PART 236. I CAN'T WAIT FOR TOMORROW !

 

The photo has NOTHING to do with what follows !

I was just rinsing my eight plates, four forks, three knives, a couple of spoons, a pair of spatulii and a mug after washing them up following my cooked breakfast of three rashers of bacon, four plum tomatoes, an egg, half a slice of delicious fried bread crust and a mug of coffee which all in had taken only slightly less than two hours to cook and eat when Shirley appeared tutting at my shoulder !

"What on earth is all the noise why eight plates and all the cutlery I've only been on the phone for three hours and note that you would have hardly heard MY voice and the racket has been diabolical oh my god the smell is awful how much washing up liquid did you use because you only need a drop and you don't need an entire kettle of boiling water so I'm going to show you how to wash up properly tomorrow" (You don't need punctuation when someone doesn't stop to take a breath !)

I think I'll set my alarm for early though I doubt whether I'll need to as I'm already feeling quite excited and probably won't sleep tonight !

SALLY....PART235. TURN YOUR HEATER BACK ON AND SOD OFF BACK TO YOUR ROOM !

 Once I had a forty foot long shipping container filled it's entire length with leather offcuts that a couple of furniture factories were desperate to get rid of and which I eventually gave away to schools and colleges once I realised that paying rent for storage was getting too expensive.

The container went.

Then over the years the factories shut and I was left with just one supplier and since the first lockdown I've not been allowed in to collect anything and so I have continued working until I'd used up every last scrap until I ended up with a massive pile of work waiting for the zips to arrive from the far east before I can finish it !

I then spent a few weeks painting watercolours which I mount onto gift cards and have been selling for years but after painting 200 I ran out of paint and so really my workshop, built as an extension to my house became obsolete and a week ago I was persuaded to turn off the heating and set up my keyboards in the main house in the alcove addition to the kitchen but I seem to have become an irritant and this morning heard the words in the title !

What had I done ? What had I said ? How can a man sitting quietly watching 80 episodes (and counting) of Spiral and occasionally writing on facebook annoy anyone ?

It's not as if I don't cheerfully do the washing up and sacrifice myself to a daily drubbing at Scrabble is it ?

SALLY....PART 234. HAS IT COME TO THIS ?

NO WORD WAS SPOKEN BUT THE ATMOSPHERE CRACKLED !

 Having meekly accepted my new LOCKDOWN role of washer up I was summoned to the sink's plughole last night where an errant sweetcorn kernel was pointed at wordlessly by a wife with a disappointed look !

SALLY...PART 233. "SHIRLEY ! HURRY, I'M STUCK !"

 

Oh for the days when my limbs did what I wanted them to without pain !

Yesterday I got warned that a plastic golf ball which had mysteriously appeared was about to block the downpipe in the inset gutter on my flat roof extension and as I don't have a ladder to climb UP to the roof I have to climb out of an upstairs bedroom window every few months to clear the thing of the build up of sludge that comes from nowhere !

So, I would open the window and using the child toilet step that Shirley still uses and which has doubled as a vomit catcher for when various children have been drunk or grandchildren poorly I'd nip up onto the windowsill with my right foot, bringing my left foot up to it and passed it and out of the window whilst dropping down to sit on the sill at the same time throwing my right foot and leg out into space !

Sounds complicated but it wasn't and relied on suppleness in the joints !

Yesterday, I couldn't even get my right foot up let alone my left !

"Get a chair and put another one out on the roof !" I was advised but I'm a man and knew better !

Somehow having rejected or failed at sensible solutions I ended up with my left leg over my head lying immovably on the windowsill with the rest of me on the roof some distance below !

I was STUCK and hadn't the strength to pull it out or push it back !

"SHIRLEY !" I bellowed as my ball and socket joint started to dislocate, "Can you come up and help me.....NOW !"

She arrived slowly having not been disturbed cooking my dinner or washing up because lockdown has led to her having contempt for the ordinary conventions of marriage and collapsed laughing at my predicament !

"What do you want me to do ?" she asked.

Many black and other inappropriate thoughts went through my mind before I answered, "Lift my foot and push it towards me !"

Well she has bad shoulders and aching arms these days, not that you'd believe it by the sounds coming out from the kitchen every morning as she chops a mountain of red onions and cheddar cheese into fragments with the speed and strength of a demented woodpecker drilling into a tree after grubs before piling it onto her toast and sticking it under the lowest possible heat of the grill for about an hour until I hear, "OH SHIT !" because she forgot all about it whilst answering her daughter's and her sister's 'Facebook Notifications' and it is all reduced to a very thin blackened biscuit....which she STILL won't give me !

Anyway, she doesn't really like any physical contact with my feet and her first attempts were pathetic !

Nothing moved accept my ball joint slightly, on its way out and so I urged her to put a bit more muscle into it !

"For God's sake PUSH AND LIFT, I'm DYING !" which she finally did, resentfully, and my heel fell out and landed with a thud as a round of applause and cheering reached us from the throng of neighbours who had collected by their back doors when they'd first heard my shouts and who you'd think had never seen two seventy year olds yelling at each other and arguing about a stuck leg after a lifetime of the wife's embittered disappointment with her husband !

I MUST buy a ladder !

 

 

SALLY...PART 232. I CAN'T ACTUALLY REMEMBER EATING !

Did I eat and if so when did I eat what I can't remember eating ?

Did I have breakfast before I went to school and if I did who gave it to me and what was it ?

I know I was collected for lunch but what was I given before being taken back to school ?

I think I probably ate crumbs as I had no flesh on my bones and nor did my brothers until the youngest came along when I was ten and my mother took advantage of the newly opened Wimpy Bar and fattened him up on them and he went on to develop ulcerative colitis !

I remember sugar sandwiches ! Brilliant for a growing child eh ? And in a doctors house too ! Mind you my father had no breakfast, a cup of milky coffee at eleven after surgery and nothing until my mother eventually somehow managed to conjure up a plate of roast potatoes and cabbage at about eight in the evening which he mashed together into a mountain and ate with no meat whatsoever and probably whilst smoking one of the forty plus Players cigarettes he smoked every day and ruined my lungs with !

I have a keen sense of a treat being getting taken to a Southend on Sea cafe where we ate buttered toast washed down with Coca Cola !

So that's my childhood neatly set out in food for you !

There was no fish, no bacon, no Full English or kedgeree or anything containing goodness but I do remember that my father developed a large paunch so was he secretly eating out ?

I don't know but I DO know that when Shirley says that I MUST remember more, I DON'T !

Right so let's carry on next time with more things I have no memory of !

SALLY...PART 231....IT'S TIME TO START TELLING THE TRUTH !

 

Shirley said I should leave the following generations at least a glimpse into what my childhood was really like so here goes !

I was born in Forest Gate in North East London in January 1949, the third of five sons of the local NHS Doctor whose practice was based in the front room of our house, a room we never entered unless it was for injections from a huge glass syringe and monstrous needle that got used for everyone and which lay in a cracked enamal dish covered in disinfectant when it wasn't causing terror !

These, you must bear in mind are my very hazy recollections !

My mother basically lived in 'the cloisters', the family name for a covered walkway between our house and the neighbours which contained hugely long coat racks with every coat that had ever been owned hanging mouldering from them and which were still there in 2001 when we sold the house, a stinking gas geezer, a washing machine with a mangle on top, three huge Dublin sinks with open drains under them and a HORRIBLE toilet at the end with an old fashioned virtually unflushable cistern high up near the ceiling which I dreaded having to visit !

Along the route to the toilet were two ancient wooden multiple washing lines that were always full of dripping clothing and sheets and which were raised and lowered by ropes that passed through rusted squealing pulleys and which were tied to the wall on double ended hooks you never see these days !

The floor seemed to be perpetually full of baskets of laundry and the sinks full of soaking clothing with the taps running permanently to rinse every trace of life from the fibres !

My mother stood losing control of this empire until it was time to take a break and prepare the meals that were inedibly unpleasant and scarred my infant mind !

I think this autobiography is going to take some time to write !

 

SALLY...PART 230. "YUK ! WHAT'S THAT DISGUSTING SMELL ?"

 "YUK ! What's that disgusting smell ?" Shirley demanded forcefully as she lit the grill above her mountainous pile of reeking red onions and finely sliced mature cheddar cheese she'd placed upon a slice of late dated 50/50 Warburtons finest and which she'd forgotten to light ten minutes before because some missing items from 'Click And Collect' had distracted her !

"I have no idea !" I said but then I barely smell anything these days so I genuinely had no idea and anyway didn't care as I was watching a mechanic replace the brake lines on a Rolls Royce whose interior had been COMPLETELY destroyed by racoons !

"It's GROSS !" she continued, and how CAN you carry on watching 'no marks' people doing brainless stuff on cars you'll never own ?" 

I had no answer to that and so stayed silent rather than start an argument about Scandi Noirs !

"It's got to be YOU ! What have you got on ?" She can be a bit intimidating when her bloods up...it rarely isn't !

"Nothing ! Pears soap if anything !" I wheedled.

"Did you use hand gel at Asda ?" she demanded, staring with hatred at my hands !

"Yes !" I stuttered, "I mean no, it was Poundland !"

"Well that explains it then, the cheapskates ! Never use it again OK ?

"OK!" and I tried to continue to watch my programme whilst looking at her because she doesn't like NOT being looked at when she's talking !

"Tea's gone up a penny !" she huffed and tutted as she walked her singed feast through to her morning settee !

SALLY...PART 229. WHY CAN'T I JUST STOP LYING TO SHIRLEY ?

 Perhaps it was my broken camera that woke me at 4am today, knowing that I'd have to find some way to justify buying a new one but as I'd buttered up my wife pretty well over the last few days with any number of pathetic sighs, general sadnesses, listlessness, making my own late night peanut butter sandwiches, eating my Marmite crisps in my room so that the smell didn't revolt her and offering to wash up the airfryer, I was sure I could pull it off !

"Don't even think of going until you've phoned them to make sure that they have the exact camera you think you saw there but I'm telling you this you didn't because why would PC World offer such a huge discount without advertising it on the internet oh no is an 0348 number free and use my phone not yours god why don't these people have a phone number right let me check again give me that number TZ100 well it says £539 in Amateur Photographer so how come you say you saw it for £249 you were obviously looking at a completely different model and anyway if it was the model you were looking at three days ago the offer won't still be on and you will have wasted six miles of diesel so just forget it !"

YES...NOT A BREATH TAKEN THERE !

It is actually impossible to talk to anyone at Currys PC World so I defiantly went and my camera WAS there and it WAS discounted and I DID buy it !

Keeping my face looking defeated once I got home has always been a problem when lying to my wife as my body goes into weird spasms as I fight to keep my face downcast !

"Well you were right ! What a waste of time and I can only apologise for not listening to you in the first place !" I groaned world wearily as she smirked in triumph !

"So what do you have to say now eh ? £249 for a TZ100, you must have imagined it ! Now stop sulking and get the front bush trimmed !"

It was at that point that happiness broke through and I produced my new toy !

"You are an arse !" She said with half an eye on the Scrabble box as she prepared herself for her next overwhelming victory !

SALLY...PART 228 ! "TURN THE LIGHT OFF OR IT'LL SEE US !"

SADLY NO PHOTOS !

ACTUALLY, WHY SPOIL THINGS ? JUST STRIP US MENTALLY WHILST READING THE FOLLOWING STORY !

When I went up to bed last night I quickly became aware of one of those HUGE lazy black flies which flew into Shirley's large round paper lantern which has hung a little dustily from the ceiling rose for the last twenty years so I hatched a cunning plan !

I climbed, wearing my outdoor shoes, onto her pristine bed and carefully eased the wire from behind those nasty sharp wire things that hold it and slid back onto the floor and towards the window to shake it out...but forgot that to open the window I would first have to open the very stiff, very old secondary glazing that I bought second hand very cheaply and fitted myself thirty years ago !

So using ALL my strength on the almost immovable sliding part I moved it aside only to be faced with a LOCKED main window which I'd fitted with one of those almost useless locks that any burglar could get through in ten seconds and into which you insert a key to unwind it but I did it, opened the window and held the lampshade outside and felt the wind from not only the fly's wings as it flew back into the house but also the wind from a Daddy Long Legs and a moth which seized the opportunity to get in to investigate our very old mercury filled long life light bulb Asda sold us for 10p fifteen years ago because we were brainwashed into doing our bit for energy conservation and which gives out a depressingly low level of light !

I still thought it a good idea to give the lampshade a shake to get rid of the dust and watched in horror as great clouds of it came away for a good five minutes and the paper disintegrated before my eyes, leaving me holding the metal bit hanging on by a thread !

Having said goodnight to my wife who was still downstairs I called out as I descended the stairs to warn her I was returning because she HATES me returning once I have said goodnight and left the room....no I don't know why either !

I explained the problem but lied about the fly being gone and went through to my room to sellotape the totally wrecked shade with slightly less than an entire roll of Poundland's worst ever tape !

Twenty minutes later I retraced my steps, passing my wife who was delaying going to bed because she knew she wouldn't be able to sleep for more than an hour and twenty minutes once she went as her waking hours are now approaching twenty two hours, not counting the many naps she has during the day !

The fly was nowhere to be seen and I prayed it had left of it's own accord and went to my bed to read before nodding off for my customary nine hours !

Shirley must have come up at some point because I was awakened by the scream of death and leapt naked to save her !

She too was naked....in the bathroom and pointing hysterically at the blackened window where the fly apparently was but which I couldn't see because I'm rubbish at seeing black things against black things !

"It's THERE you idiot !" she screamed, quivering behind me and pointing as far as I couldn't see, at nothing !

"Turn the light off or it'll see us !"

I briefly wondered if she was worried that a large and lazy black fly might vomit at the sight of two naked seventy year olds looking for him with the light off !

I was too tired to argue or try to fathom out that bit of logic !

"KILL IT, you useless man, it's THERE !", pointing somewhere else ! "No THERE !", pointing somewhere else again !

I soon became disoriented as her screams, the fly's non-appearance and exhaustion started to overwhelm me !

"Can you just get out of here and let me do what a man has to do Shirley ?" I pleaded !

"No because you're blind and deaf and nothing without me...THERE IT IS ! KKKIIILLLLLL IIIITTT !!!!"

And finally I smote it a stunning flick with my personal towel and it lay dazed between the grandchildren's toothbrushes !

"Grab it ! Squash it ! KILL IT !" she cried out again and I did so in six pieces of toilet paper as I don't like the sound or feel of popping flies and went to throw the carcass out of the window !

"NNNNOOOO ! Do not open the window you idiot, you'll let them all in ! Put it down the toilet !"

So I did and flushed but the thing's body remained floating on the water until I'd flushed it again !

I staggered to my bed and as I lay there heard Shirley flushing the toilet three more times which she'll note when she checks the water usage on the water meter shortly !

And then this morning I noticed the Daddy Long Legs lying drowned in the bathroom sink beside Shirley's flannel and chose not to mention it to her after I'd thrown it out !

SALLY...PART 227 ! SHIRLEY CALLED OUT, "DON'T FORGET, NO UNSOCIAL DISTANCING !"

"AND HE'S ON HOW MANY TABLETS ?" A FRIEND AND MY WIFE HAVING A GOOD LAUGH AT MY EXPENSE !

Although I'm still working flattish out there's no question that I have put on weight just under my chest and above my hips !

I don't yet have what even polite people call a 'gunt', a term not too hard to work out and Joe Wicks has been of no use whatsoever in preventing its appearance so I have taken matters into my own hands by cycling at least a mile a day and doing so slowly so as not to tire myself out !

Today I went to the chemist to get my stuff and I'm pretty sure it's that stuff given to me to keep me alive that is killing me...statins being the latest...even the former head of heart surgery and a pioneer in transplants with whom I played golf refused to take them !

As I set off I heard the familiar sound of the front patio doors squawking open and knew that more instructions were about to be given !

"NO unsocial distancing and don't go in if anyone else is in as I need you to carry on earning !" is what I might have heard if I had listened but as I didn't I'm only guessing !

I cycled along my road which had no cars in it or people on the pavement, cut through to the tarmac paths that lead across the playing fields, seeing no-one, cut through to the next main road which was deserted, shot up to the shop which had no-one outside or in it, padlocked my old unattractive, relunctantly donated small man's bike to the same fence from which Shirley had had her beautiful gold unpadlocked ladies bicycle stolen from on the morning of 9/11 and carefully looked around me, noting that there wasn't a soul to be seen !

I entered the shop where a terrified looking assistant came forward with my bag and demanded my postcode from behind several clear plastic face shields, and several yards behind a huge plastic shield fitted around the counter and which oddly finished halfway across the shop thereby negating any protective purpose it might have served !

She dropped my order onto the counter and ran back to her solitary work station, a tiny cramped place where SIX assistants normally stand shoulder to shoulder ALL day long and shouted, "NOW GET OUT ! SHOO ! QUICKLY !"

I sauntered to the door wearing a casual sneer, exited, saw no-one, mounted my steed, rode the entire way home without seeing another human and found my wife, startled by my speedy return, wiping the remains of her daily red onion and cheese on toast off her almost non existent lips which both she and I have found to be THE perfect foodstuff for guaranteeing social distancing betwen us !

"GOOD GOD you were quick ! Did you stay socially undistanced ?"

"It's socially DIStanced and yes I did and there wasn't even a dog walker out !"

"Get the Scrabble out then...it's time for your thrashing !"

And she won for the seventh out of the last eight times !

SALLY...PART 226 ! DANIEL THE TEN YEAR OLD ARACHNOPHOBE, TECHNICALLY, NEVER SHUTS UP !

HEADBUTTA AGED THREE AND WHO NOW AGED TEN HASN'T 'ACCIDENTALLY' HEADBUTTED ANYONE AT SCHOOL FOR MONTHS, ONLY BECAUSE SCHOOL'S SHUT !

You have to go into a yogic state of mind if you are to survive a session with Daniel, 10, who technically (his favourite word apart from 'yeh ?' when he's describing something, ANYTHING, to whoever will listen to him !) never shuts up so I took a deep breath before opening his front door to collect him for a bike ride yesterday afternoon !

HIS LOVE OF PEPPERAMI STARTED EARLY !

I DID NOT go in because of this STUPID virus thing and simply called out his name, "Daniel, are you coming for a bike ride ? Daniel ! DANIEL ! DDAANNIIEELL !"

"I'm just getting dressed !" he called from a long way away.

"It's FOUR O'CLOCK, why aren't you dressed ?"

"I've been doing my homework !"

Now if one good thing has emerged from the schools being shut it's the fact that Daniel's HUGE brain has not been getting him into detention and he hasn't 'accidentally' headbutted any other child for several months now and instead has produced work of a remarkably HIGH standard on his own !

He appeared in his porch with an UPTURNED pint glass and a bit of scrunched up paper.

"What's that for Daniel ?"

"There's a spider under my trainer and I'm an arachnophobe !" he said, pushing the shoe with one foot outstretched, at which a REALLY fast small spider ran straight back under it !

He simply couldn't coordinate his brain, his foot and his two hands to catch the thing so I said, "Put the paper down as it's no use to man or beast, get your glass down near the trainer and as you move it quickly trap the spider under it." which he did easily and then carefully slid a card under it and carried the creature safely outside to a bush where he triumphantly released it having told me he was an arachnophobe a hundred times during the operation !

I BET HE COULDN'T HAVE DEALT WITH THE ONE IN MY GARAGE !

He then led me two miles to the beach, talking the whole time about cat based simulated war games, not stopping to take a breath as he leapt off sand dunes, smashed rocks and didn't seem bothered by the fact that I repeatedly fell asleep whilst doing my best to follow his detailed descriptions !

I seem to remember that the cats were naked and the female ones held their spears over their 'centreealised parts' !

DANIEL TALKING NON STOP AT THE SAME AS LEAPING !

He wouldn't eat a Jaffa Cake or packet of crisps I'd taken for a picnic and he wouldn't accept my money to go into a shop on the way to get some sweets because he's determined to cut his body fat down from 6%, or perhaps not let it rise above it, and he wants to get his stomach muscles 'ripped' although he had eaten three bread sticks and two pepperami for lunch !

"That's not a proper lunch Daniel !"

"Well normally I cook myself an omelette but I was too busy and forgot !"

He was probably painting yet more of the hundred War Hammer models he's made !

TALKED TO DEATH AND DEFEATED BY THE FIVE YEAR OLD CHESS MASTER WHO REFUSED TO USE A BOARD !

He's TEN for God's sake and I really want to be around to see what he becomes, perhaps a politician as he already resembles one of my least liked Ministers, Michael Gove !

NOTHING IS BEYOND THIS BOY AS YOU CAN SEE FROM THIS MODEL OF THE EIFFEL TOWER WHICH HE BUILT AND WIRED UP WITHOUT ANY HELP !

SALLY...PART 225. SHIRLEY'S FALLEN OFF HER BIKE AGAIN !

It's only two years since her last fall and that one was caused by her trying to ride over soaking wet, slippery as ice railway tracks set into the cobbles at the harbour over a hundred years ago !

I wasn't there as I'd had to get back for some reason that now totally escapes me but when she got home, battered and bruised she said it was so instant that she hadn't even been able to put out a hand and went straight down onto one side leading to months of pain and even a visit to the doctors after about six weeks !

Fortunately her injuries did not prevent her from cooking my dinners otherwise I'd have starved to death by now !

Apparently two men stood nearby saw the whole thing and DIDN'T even help her up or ask her if she was alright which was SO kind of them !

So last night as we idled home from the beach along a sixfoot wide tarmac path with me in my customary Prince Philip position just behind her and unable to understand a word she was muttering between her clamped jaws....and I don't need to be behind her on a bike not to understand what she mutters to me between her clamped jaws....I was suddenly aware that her front wheel had fallen off the path and leapt down a quarter of an inch cliff onto the grass and as if in slow motion this was followed by the slowest crash you have ever seen as first one leg went out to rebalance her and then the other, with the bike twisting beneath her throwing her off to the left, that is back onto the path where she landed on her hands, one knee and then sort of gently onto her right cheek as gravity and momentum took over !

I leapt off my steed and was at her side before all her body parts had stopped rebounding against one another, reminding me of a wave breaking against a sea wall !

I got her up and sat her back on her saddle after checking that there were no bones sticking out of anywhere and off we went with her saying, "I must have stopped concentrating for a second there when I was telling you something and anyway it's not stiff enough !"

"What isn't ?"

""My handlebars or the wheel or something ! My old bike that was stolen from outside the Co-op on the day of  9/11 was much stiffer !"

"I'll have a look tomorrow !"

"Don't bother ! I'm never riding a bike again !"

"But what if we go out and buy you a new one tomorrow when all the non-essential shops reopen after the lockdown !"

"No we won't because I'm never going into a shop again !"

"Why not ?"

"Because I NEVER go shopping because I always send you with your little lists and your trolley and haven't been in one for twenty years and I'm not starting again now just to catch the virus !"

"The virus has gone !"

"Oh, you're an expert now are you ?"

"No but I just know...you'll see !"

"You're an idiot !"

"There is that !" I said, wondering how bonkers she would go if I turned up with a new bike for her...and a helmet !

ANOTHER CARD TRICK FROM THE CELLAR GONE SLIGHTLY WRONG !

SALLY...PART 224. THE LOCKDOWN AS SEEN FROM A BLACKBIRD'S NEST !

YOU'LL JUST HAVE TO BELIEVE  THAT THE NEST IS IN THE BUSH BESIDE THE TRAMPOLINE !

May 11th 2020. Day 77

I haven't stepped out of my house since this self isolation started except to drive to my daughter's house in the first couple of days to pick up some shopping left outside her front door and you might expect us to be going off our heads but we're NOT...honestly !

WAITING TO BE PLANTED OUT

We're tanned because we've had weeks of hot sun and sat or laid in our completely sheltered garden soaking up the sunshine !

CORNFLOWERS AT THEIR BEST !

I eventually stopped working because I wanted to learn the piano and I can now play it brilliantly, as far as I'm concerned, so I was a bit shocked when Shirley walked into my room last night at nine and shouted, "FOR GOD'S SAKE GET BACK TO WORK !" and stormed out shouting to the moon, "If I have to listen to you playing 'To A Wild Rose', 'The Swan' or 'Fur Fucking Elise' once more I WILL go mad !"

I knew in my heart that she was right and returned to my table and picked up my Stanley knife before immediately putting it down again because I'd forgotten to do my ten minutes of 'Joe Wicks' or my ten minutes of chest expanders either !

ONE OF THE MINUTE JUMPING SPIDERS THAT LIVE ON THE BRICKWORK

Sat once again today in our red hot garden I thrashed her at our daily dose of excitement, a game of Scrabble, aware that the female blackbird nesting in the bush flew straight at us whenever she left her nest to seek food for her babies, apparently determined to scare us off whereas the male flew off avoiding us completely.

HERE'S THE FATHER STARING US OUT, IMPERCEPTIVELY SHAKING HIS HEAD IN WONDER AS WE SAT ARGUING ABOUT NOTHING  !

"HE'S been gone a long time !" Shirley said, irritated by my sitting there with my trigger finger poised waiting to take a slowmo of the bird's comings and goings.

"He's probably having a chat !" I quipped light heartedly.

"Why do you always have to say something stupid ?" I was asked and not for the first time.

"I was just being funny !" I replied.

"Well you're not !" she said and not for the first time either !

" If  I hadn't done the dirty on your brother forty nine years ago when you turned up sniffing around on my doorstep with your tight blue trousers with the large red fly buttons on the outside we wouldn't be sat here arguing now !" she sighed.

"Correct, if I hadn't done the dirty by nicking you from my brother the moment I set eyes on you you'd be sitting here with my brother instead !"

"Hm !" she said, quite annoyed, knowing if only she could admit it that she'd made the right choice !

MEANWHILE...down the garden the lady blackbird said to her husband, "Those two ! Do they EVER stop bickering ? If there's another lockdown next year I'm not nesting in THIS garden again so you'd better keep your eyes open for somewhere else d'you hear ?"

"Yes dear", he replied, vomitting up some partially digested worms for the chicks !

SALLY...PART 223. THERE ARE NONE SO BLIND........

I had to return to my Dispensing Optician today to ask him why my left eye is off a bit and he demonstrated to me that with one lens fine and one with a little cataract building up they could only make one eye perfect whilst the other remained a little hazy at long distances !

"It's all to do with the cataract not allowing an image to focus on the retina !" he said, illustrating his words with a similar drawing to mine.

The clear lens at the top allows the image to focus onto the retina whereas the cataract in the lower sketch won't allow a sharp image to focus on the retina but just in front of it ! My readings of 66 and 675 mean NOTHING to me !

Anyway I showed this sketch to my wife this evening once I'd got her to briefly look up from the latest ScandiNoir !

"Are you saying that the pupil is a hole ?" she asked, with her eyes on her screen !

Shirley didn't know that the pupil was a hole that light rays passed through !

 "Yes !" I replied incredulously.
 
"I never knew that !"

"You never knew that the pupil was a hole that light passed through ?"

"No."

"Well how did you think that light got through to your retina ?"

"I don't know, I've never thought about it !"

I am now back in my room and it occured to me that when we first met I pointed romantically at the full moon as we lay on Brighton beach listening to waves breaking on the shore and said, "I think he's smiling down on us tonight !"

"There's a man in the moon looking at us ?" my then girlfriend asked !

"Who's looking down at us ?" she said, sitting up and destroying the atmosphere I'd spent at least a minute building up !

"The man in the moon !" I murmured, urging her to return to a more comfortable prone position !

"There's a man in the moon looking at US ?" she asked, refusing to lie back down !

"Of course there's a man in the moon, look, there he is !"

"Well I've never seen HIM before !" she said after putting on her glasses which I didn't know she needed !

I could have walked away but I had other things on my mind !

My wife continued to watch her programme and I went back to sewing THIRTY SEVEN wallets !

SALLY...PART 222 ! COOKING MY OWN BREAKFAST !

Waiting for an untrackable parcel of zips is a pain as my doorbell is INSIDE my porch so no one knows it's there and Shirley can't STAND having to keep an eye and ear open for a man who doesn't realise that our doorbell is hidden so I had to cook my own breakfast today and how hard can that be ?

Ignoring all dictated recommendations I poured FAR too much oil into the smallest frying pan, heated it up FAR too high and then threw three frozen thick Richmond sausages into it without first pricking them which of course is impossible to do when they are as hard as iron !

Amazing how far boiling oil can travel isn't it ?

I then opened the window and fanned furiously to get the worst of the smoke out and reached for four tomatoes which I couldn't be bothered to slice and threw THEM in with the sausages too !

Amazing the force an unsliced tomato thrown into a mixture of boiling oil and sausage fat can explode with isn't it ?

I then used wet tea towels to seal the gaps in the door that divided the kithchen from the lounge where my wife's now muffled shouts were coming from !

I next carefully opened the tin of baked beans that we had been hoarding for when Coronavirus strikes and found that had I read the label I would have seen that sausages were a part of the contents so I carefully spooned them out into a dish and covered them with a few spare beans, covered the whole lot with a tea plate and put it in the fridge ready for a snack later and microwaved just a portion of beans for FAR too long in a dish without a lid on it and as quietly as possible wiped out the inside surfaces of the machine whilst whistling loudly enough to disguise what I was doing!

Unfortunately if there's ONE thing that Shirley can't stand it's me whistling and her demand for me to cease did NOT sound very muffled !

Now anyone can fry an egg can't they ? Yes of course they can and mine was PERFECT because I'm not stupid !

Nor did I burn the two slices of toast THAT badly before joining Shirley in the lounge to eat whilst she continued to stare out of the window cursing any vehicle that drove into our road that wasn't 'our' delivery van !

In my man's mind I'm a good washer upper and even did the dry fryer or whatever it's called that Shirley had left in the sink unwashed because her thumbs, behind her knees and somewhere else I'd rather not mention and she doesn't want me to mention hurt !

Some time later I heard any number of tuts and got called back into the kitchen to be shown dried egg on my plate and dried fish on the dry fryer and told not to bother washing up ever again unless I could change my ways and do it as well as a woman can !

Some time later, 12:45 to be precise, when hunger drove Shirley into the kitchen to chop yet MORE onions to pile onto her cheese on toast that she had to eat as I was still too full to share a frozen curry she heard a faint banging on the door which turned out to be my zips which were about to be taken back to the depot for a second time because the man couldn't get a response from us or any of the neighbours !

I scrawled something on his phone screen that couldn't be used in a court of law to identify me as the recipient and we both sank onto the settee, exhausted by the day's tension !

That's me and my wife not me and the delivery driver !

SALLY...PART 221...1917..WHEN SOMETHING IS THAT BAD LISTEN TO ME...DON'T GO OK ?

I went on my own to see the critically acclaimed film 1917 this afternoon !

Shirley didn't want to go and although she suggest I waited until I could take Dylan, 14. I told her that there was no way I could relax and enjoy a serious film with him eating beside me for two hours solid because that is what he does at the cinema !

Actually everyone seems to these days and I suppose they have to if they are to maintain their morbid obesities !

I instantly sensed amateurism, that is within one minute and hated every following stupid CGI moment in it...so DON'T GO...OK ?

Bombs do NOT land and explode two feet behind, beside or in front of you and leave you running, they blow you to pieces and aeroplanes do not crash at your feet and leave you to go the well for a helmetful of water !

You do NOT jump into a river in full spate, get carried hundreds of yards downstream, come up for air for the fifieth time and three quarters dead go over a two hundred foot waterfall flowing at a similar rate to Niagara Falls in full spate, come up again and swim leisurely to the riverbank before climbing over a hundred rotting corpses and start running again after joining in a particularly annoying hymn about someone's MOTHER whilst your heavy twill uniform miraculously dries out...DO YOU ?

That might very well be my last visit to the flicks !

SALLY...Part 220. THE INVISIBLE MAN !

A SUPERFAN turned up today and was in the early throes of worshipping me when my wife walked into my room and started chatting to her and LIKE MAGIC, I became invisible !

It's not the first time this has happened as whenever more than one woman gathers around me I disappear !

It's not only women that have this effect as whenever my family visit I also could be non-existent !

My daughter and her mother totally talk right through me even when I have a valid point to make though neither of them obviously thinks so and my daughter always seems particularly keen to point out why no-one WANTS to listen to me !

The other day I ended up jumping up and down and screaming at them to shut up and listen to what I had to say, as I was a human with his own mind and opinions...but they simply carried on talking to each other...as if I was dead and didn't exist...actually simply as if I didn't exist and had never existed !

My sons also consider my views an irrelevance as does the entire rest of the world...but back to women !

I watch groups of them, especially Hen Parties, all talking and laughing at the same time walking towards my stall and try and spot which one is actually listening to any of the others or if it's only two which one can stop talking for long enough to hear what her friend is saying and I never succeed !

ARE any of you listening ?

Oh and my grandchildren don't even hear me speak unless I'm asking them if they want some sweets !

I generally get all this out of my system by going to market and talking about myself ALL day without caring whether anyone is listening or not which they're not...it's GREAT therapy and has so far kept me away from standing on street corners waving my fist and shouting at passing traffic !

Unfortunately I decided not to go to market today as the weather forecast was bad and this has led to a backwash of tension that is NOT good and whilst I was busy changing Shirley's bike's rear wheel inner tube hoping to somehow get into her good books and what a fool I am to even try, I heard the familiar COMMAND reverberating through three walls, "GET THAT BLOG OFF or at least change the bit about people you KNOW you can't insult ! What were you thinking of ? "

So I've removed that bit !

"And why is the butter out and not put away ?"

"Because it's empty, scraped clean to within an nanomillimetre of its life !"

"Not in my book it's not !"

Ah is that the rain approaching ?

I bloody well hope so !

SALLY...PART 219 ! MAN WASHES UP TEASPOON !

I mostly do NOTHING in my kitchen apart from making a mug of coffee because A) I have a relentless work schedule in my next door workshop and B) Shirley or my children could never STAND to eat anything I ever tried to cook and C) I use every implement in the place just to boil an egg and D) I use too much hot water to wash up and then don't stand the cutlery the right way up or the plates leaning the right way so I stay out !

HOWEVER, this morning I had to go and pick up Daniel who I'd been told knew how to turn his dishwasher on but dishwashers irritate me as I think that they make naturally lazy people even lazier !

Even Daniel at ten has no patience with me but DID show me how to place the soap in the slot and pour some rinsing aid into its pot !

He's clever but I still washed up my coffee mug and teaspoon in his sink as I'm pretty sure he would have criticised me if I hadn't !

I LIKE washing up and rinsing things PROPERLY and it's the same with ironing...I ENJOY it...and I enjoy HOOVERING, especially the EDGES !

I wouldn't even mind using a mangle which has no place in a modern home and which I remember watching my frazzled mother use, Sally of the Blog title, struggling to turn the handle as she wrecked her five sons' clothes in it !

I don't mind cleaning the toilet or the tiles or the mould that regularly reappears on the bathroom grouting, for which I keep an old toothbrush at the extreme left hand edge of the bathroom windowsill and it is a toothbrush that led to a bit of tension early this morning !

My own toothbrush sits on its own just to the right of the mould removal toothbrush and Shirley used MINE to clean around the base of the taps which is MY job !

I didn't mean to grab it out of her hand quite so aggressively and pointlessly as I wouldn't be using it again and this resulted in some quite beastly name calling and general tantrums as my explanation of which is the cleaning toothbrush didn't sink in and wasn't helped by the fact that there were two other old toothbrushes in the cleaning toothbrushes position !

I had NO proper answer to her questions of why I hadn't thrown the other two out and why I hadn't cleaned around the bottom of the taps in the first place which would have saved her having to do a job which wasn't hers to do !

She then threw 'Michael' back in my face and told me to get back to him before my life turned bleak once I'd been off Facebook for over five minutes !

She went back to bed because she now only sleeps for a minute and a half most nights, including getting up for three if not four wees during that time and I slyly went and cooked myself an eggy bread which I only burnt on one side !

Just as I had finished eating and gathered the twenty items I'd used to take to the sink Shirley reappeared, more irritable with me than ever because the noise of the spatula being placed quietly on the glued together cooking implement dish had woken her up and ordered me to get out as she couldn't bear to see the mess I'd make or pull out the settee and insert the bent handle to pull open the meter cupboard door to check the electric meter to see how much  electricity I'd use boiling three kettles for the washing up !

So now things have calmed down and I can get back to work before being summoned through for my daily thrashing at Scrabble !

SALLY...Part 218. THE BLOODY HUNT REVISITED ! https://davidnashleather.blogspot.com/2012/02/interludethats-all-i-need-bloody-hunt.html

THE SIGN MIGHT HAVE BEEN ALTERED SLIGHTLY BUT THE POSE IS GENUINE AS WE WAITED FOR NO ONCOMING TRAFFIC TO PASS AND THE LIGHTS TO CHANGE !

It's years since Shirley was terrified by the sound of The Hunt hurtling along the lane we were walking up back to the town on Lindisfarne and although The Hunt turned out to be a crowing cockerel and a yappy Jack Russell she was nervous as we set out on a freezing walk around the castle and back up a different lane !

BLINDING LIGHT AND A CRUEL WIND !

She wanted to walk even further, like a couple more miles but I went all brave and God knows where I dug that out of and insisted on a shortcut !

ALREADY QUITE SOME WAY AHEAD OF ME !

She's ALWAYS walked further than necessary or than is sensible for someone who generally doesn't do much long distance walking or anything else very physical as a rule and I dread things once I see her reading from her list of requirements and watch in horror as she gathers enough stuff to last a month in the Antarctic which I'm going to have to carry in an SAS sized rucksack as I plod wearily after her as she strides along in her Brasher boots whilst I struggle after her dressed in cheap unwaterproofed trainers through which I can feel every tiny pebble !

THE RECEPTION COMMITTEE LINED UP READY TO WELCOME THE FISHERMAN HOME !

As the gap between us grows longer and her demands fade thankfully into thin air I find myself staring at her quite short legs and wonder how she does it...she actually, at five feet, walks faster than I can at six feet !

I was skirting a beach when the unbelieveable happened, a REAL hunting horn blared out and I, normally calm, jumped out of my skin and ran forwards to catch my wife before she fainted clean away but she didn't appear terror struck because she realised that the blast was actually her incoming message alert tone on her ancient Iphone 4 which she had stuffed into my chest pocket !

I BELIEVE HE FELT LIKE ME !

It didn't help that I was wearing ear muffs and a thick woollen hat pulled right down to my eyebrows which made it impossible for me to place the sound accurately and also made it impossible for any passing woman to EVER fancy me ! Actually, wearing long white woollen gloves under my ski gloves and which stuck out creating a particularly uncool look also ensured no passing woman would fancy me, as did my second hand Wrangler jeans that have a waist band that continually slips down my backside adding to my overall look of something even a dog wouldn't drag in !

NO WIND ? WELL WHAT'S THAT THEN.....WITH BAMBURGH CASTLE IN THE BACKGROUND !

I bravely refused to sit on a damp beach whilst she reapplied her anti thigh rub gel and turned for home down a lane that lay under several feet of mud and puddles and slopped my way back to the Mead shop where I discovered that 'Dark' Mead is delicious and added several bottles to the rucksack that had rubbed great welts into my shoulders and staggered back to the car and watched in horror as my wife, now running with sweat in the -1*C, to her, heatwave and that I was shivering in, reached for the atlas, intent on finding somewhere else to go !

YES, I HAD TO PLODGE THROUGH THIS IN CHEAP THIN UNWATERPROOFED TRAINERS WHILST MY WIFE MARCHED CONFIDENTLY AND DRILY ALONG IN HER BRASHER BOOTS !

I'M REALLY HAPPY JUST TO LOOK AT LINDIFARNE FROM MY CAFE TABLE IN 'THE BARN AT BEAL' !