In Which I Unexpectedly Buy A New Coat

It was good to get home on Wednesday. It must be said that a  five day trip away, when on four of those days you drive solidly for six hours, isn't fun. Especially when the reason for the trip is not a particularly happy one.

To look at the positives though, well we saw both our boys. We stayed with the younger one in Kirkcaldy both coming and going, and the elder one came up to Sheffield to see us and that was nice. I mean no disrespect to either my daughter-in-law or my grandson when I say it was lovely to see him without his family in tow. I'm sure readers with married children will appreciate what I mean.

I also bought a new coat. I didn't really plan to, but I've been thinking for several years that I ought to get myself a black coat. This just shows how sadly anxious I can be to conform to societal expectation, because the only reason I ever contemplated buying a black coat was that when you go to a funeral in Orkney everyone is wearing one. Well everyone except me obviously. And I felt I stuck out like a sore thumb. When we first came here we didn't go to funerals at all because we didn't know anyone, but as the years have gone on we have attended a fair few and  I have become more and more self conscious about my cream coat. It's beautiful and warm and quite posh, but there was no doubt about it - it was the wrong colour. So when we were at one stage during our trip marooned in Meadowhall  I began a rather desultory search for a black coat - and they're rarer than you might think! In the end Son No 1 spotted a rather nice one in the Jacques Vert shop. Since it fitted and was undoubtedly black I couldn't really think of a good reason not to get it, and the fact that it was in the sale and almost half its original price just sealed the deal really.

 

Of course it's still in the boot of the car, several days later. Because although the joiner managed to pull the bedroom apart while we were away no problem, progress on putting it back together has been somewhat slower. So the coat could either join a pile of clothes on a bed, or stay in the car. It's probably better in the car really.

Going Away Again

So, assuming that the wind drops as forecast, the ferries will run tomorrow and we'll be trekking south once more. I'm usually pleased to get off island, although to be fair we don't usually volunteer to leave in January or February, but the trip currently in prospect doesn't really fill me with joy.

 

We're off at the crack of dawn, and back late Wednesday and most of the time in between will be spent driving relatively long distances every day. Our ultimate destination is Sheffield, where we'll be doing some sick visiting. We're then coming back via Glasgow, where I have a meeting with my supervisor followed by a talk at Scottish Opera about  progress on their Theatre Royal Upgrade. And we'll see both boys while we're away which is good.

 

Additionally while we're gone the joiner is coming back to pull our bedroom to bits and then, I hope, put it back together much more nicely. That's the theory and it's A Good Thing that he can do it while we're away. But I could have done without spending most of the last two days emptying it and looking for places to put all the stuff that came out of it. And I just know it's going to take four times as long as I think to get it decorated, re-carpeted and the new furniture to be chosen and bought. It will be the story of the bathroom all over again.

 

But, says my optimistic self, It Will All Be Worth It In The End. Just gotta keep believin'.

 

Please Miss, Am I Doing This Right?

They tell you that doing this Ph D stuff is lonely work and I've never really understood that. I mean, yes, of course you're 'ploughing a lone furrow', because it's your Ph D and the whole point of doing it is that it's something that hasn't been done before. That's not a difficult concept. And yes you're working 'all on your own', but then when have you ever not? I didn't write my MA essays and dissertations in tandem with other people. There wasn't a joint essay where, after long arguments about the relative merits and demerits of the Bronte Sisters I wrote half an admiring essay on Anne's work  while someone else did the other half on Charlotte's. It's never been much more than me and the books.

 

But there is something different about the Ph D and it's something I'm struggling with. No-one checks up on what you're doing. I'm not saying I want to fill in a time sheet to prove I'm putting in the hours, but I would feel more confident if someone said 'What are you doing? Why? Is that the best way to go about it?' It may be that this in effect is the Big Step Up: they make a sweeping suggestion like 'It would be good to compare your poet with the other poets writing at the time' and together you narrow that down to some poets and some themes. And then you're cast adrift to get on with it. Which is fine. I'm rowing in the right direction I know, I just feel it would be good if someone checked to see if I'm doing the navigation right. Perhaps all other students have a high confidence in their own micro-methodology. Perhaps I should have a high confidence in mine.  But I don't.

 

I press on regardless, and in the hope that my next candidate for compare and contrast is a happier bunny than Norman MacCaig. (Who incidentally would have been intellectually horrified at the concept of calling a bunny  happy.)

'Twas on a Monday Norning when the Gas Man came to Call......

You may remember that references were made in the middle of last month to a bathroom refurbishment  which we were told would be finished in time for Christmas. Which it was, if by finished you mean that it was useable. If by finished you mean with all the work done and dusted then we were off by a mean streak.

 

We thought we would get almost done when we booked the tiler to come last week and tile the floor. Sadly when she came she determined that the floor wasn't secure enough to put tiles on and that it needed reinforcing. Joiner came yesterday to lay new ply and he made a really good job of that. Sadly he also seems to have caused a leak in the toilet inflow pipe, something which the OH noticed not long before the tiler arrived this morning. (Not that he knew it was the inflow pipe of course, but he did know that the floor underneath the toilet was, all of a sudden, very very wet.)

 

So we have phoned the joiner who has phoned his plumber of preference who happens to be working in the area and he will come tomorrow and fix the leak and the tiler will tile under the toilet and the plumber will put it back and, and, and....well in theory, and all will be well.

 

It might be judicious to point out to the plumber when he comes, and I have to say that promises notwithstanding I am not going to hold my breath until he is actually through the door, that we are still waiting for him to put in the heated towel rail that was part of the original bathroom plan. We have been without heat in the bathroom since the work started in mid-December. I would find this inconvenient at most times of the year, in the depths of a cold and windy Orkney winter it is well nigh impossible. With apologies to any who might be reading this, what is it about plumbers?

 

This was supposed to be the month I lost myself in the poetry of Norman MacCaig, but what with one thing and another, that's turning out to be an impossible dream. When I'm just reading or making notes I like to study at home because it's warm, it's generally quiet and the chairs are comfortable. However those benefits are currently cancelled out by noise, hassle and general discomfort so tomorrow I'm off to Uni to find some peace and some focus. This is all the more urgent because next week I have another meeting with my supervisor and it would be nice if I could have something worthwhile to say. It would also be nice if I had a finished bathroom, but I suspect the best I can hope on those two is a one all draw.

December Round Up

We thought we were going to have a busy December and had plans to do all sorts of things that we have either not fancied previously or just not organised ourselves sufficiently to do. As previously mentioned, the weather put paid to doing a lot of those things that relied on being able to cross the barriers safely in the dark  this year, but for what it's worth

 

 

 

We went to the switching on of the village Christmas Tree. It was absolutely freezing and we made the mistake of turning up ten minutes early....there was a great turn out though, the oldest inhabitant pressed the buttons after a 10 second countdown and then we all took grateful shelter in the village hall to warm up and partake of punch and nibbles. It was a fun evening.

 

 

Next up was the Christmas Soup Lunch at the Cathedral.

 

 

 

There's one of these every month in the winter but the December one is always a bit special - this is an OH photo special, so not the picture I'd have taken. But you can at least see the tree and some rather jolly napkins etc.In addition to the normal soup, bread and cheese at Christmas there are always home bakes, mince pies and coffee and tea. And for once I think between us we knew everyone else on our table, which was really nice.

 

We missed the lighting of the Norwegian Tree in Kirkwall and the St Lucy Concert because of the weather. But we did get to see the Reindeer. One of the local stores imported some reindeer for the festive season so we made a trip to see them. They weren't doing anything very interesting when we visited, as the photos attest, but I gather that later in the week the white one made a dash for freedom and had to be rounded up in the Lidl carpark! They were Mato and Springbok and I think the white one was Mato, but don't take that as gospel.

 

The shop concerned always has a special top floor display in December, complete with tree, and open fire and lovely foodie gifts.

 

Our own decorations went up quite late - there was a good reason for that but it escapes me now. Anyway, behold our tree -





 

and son No 2 on The Day

 

 

Once again it was just the three of us as Son No 1's in-laws always insist that that branch of the family go to them, which is hurtful as we'd like to share a Christmas with them now and again, something which doesn't seem to occur to the 'other side',  but there's no point in getting bitter. We enjoyed  the Christmas that we had, which after all is the main thing.

 

 

 

Sad Stuff

I was all set to blog yesterday, something along the lines of how we'd had a busy week but we were looking forward to getting back into our normal routine for the rest of January: OH to work and me to study. I was going to say that I had designated January as Norman MacCaig month and how I thought I was actually going to enjoy reading his stuff much more than I had anticipated  and how interesting it was looking at him in comparison with 'my' poet, because although they were almost exact contemporaries and they both wrote a lot about nature, amongst other things, they're very different in other ways.

 

And then we had a telephone call with some very upsetting family news and spent most of the day in deep shock. Sort of taking it in today, but we're both still quite restless and finding it difficult to concentrate.

 

I know from previous experience that even with bad news eventually  you do recover a sort of equilibrium and find it possible to reclaim normal life on a day to day basis, but I have to say the prospect of the next few months is not a very pleasant one. Although I have no intention of recording the bad bits here. This blog was never designed for emotional outpourings, except for humorous indignation at books and TV and actors who cause ankle breaks, so you don't need to worry that if you drop by again, you'll find yourself drowning in misery. In fact if I can get myself into gear, there should be some late pictures of Christmas trees up here in the next couple of days.

Psst - Wanna Buy a Flat?

We have spent most of the day at our holiday flat in Birsay because there was a man coming to value it.

Yes, I have finally decided to sell it. It's been quite fun running it as a holiday let, but it has got to the stage now where I would like the opportunity to go away in the summer if I'd like to and only have the cats to worry about. We'd like our weekends back too; it would be nice to spend sunny Saturdays doing nice stuff together, rather than doing a flat turnaround. And really although 99% of our visitors have been at the least fine, and mostly very nice indeed, and some have been lovely people that I would even have liked to befriend in real life, the other 1% have become much less bearable.

 

It's a ground floor flat in a 3 storey house and the people who own the top two floors have expressed a vague interest in buying it so that they will then own the whole building. I very much hope that they will buy it privately as that will make the whole thing a lot easier all round, but they wanted a professional valuation on which to base any offer they might make, so that's why we had the man in.

 

So it's a case of wait and see what happens; if they don't want it, it's going on the open market regardless. I have no sense of current property values in Orkney so I'll be interested to see what the valuer says - here's hoping it's more than we paid for it.

'...a strange metallic thing...' - yer wot?

I am quite loth to knit presents for people. I do it occasionally, if I know it's something they want, or will appreciate, and I can persuade myself that it will be of a high enough standard.

This year though I let the OH persuade me to knit something for his mother as part of her Christmas present. It was a neck wrap, in a sparkly yarn that looked nothing like wool (hardly surprising since none of the component fibres had ever seen hide nor hair of a sheep) but I had done a couple already, one for a swap and one for myself and so I bought some in a colour that he said she would like, whipped it up and gave it to him. He wrapped it up, put it in an envelope with the other part of her present - a pair of ear-rings that OH had made - and we sent it off.

 

And everything was fine, until the Skype call on Christmas Day. I was on my way to join in this when I heard  my elder brother-in-law ask the OH 'er, one thing, Mum had this strange metallic thing in her parcel. We've no idea what it is and we wondered if was actually for her or even if it was supposed to be there'.

 

I was a bit put out - not so much that they didn't know what it was, although I'd have thought that 30 seconds concentrated thought might have given them some ideas, including the correct one, but the 'is it supposed to be there?' Was it in an envelope addressed to her? Was it wrapped up in Christmass-y paper?  I won't do the rhetorical about a tag because as I said above I did leave it to the OH and I'm not convinced that he put a tag on it, but even without a tag....

 

I know these things look like the proverbial wrung out rag when you see them on a  table and here is the proof

 

 

 

but they look fantastic on.

Thwarted!

So we got Son No 2 back to his flat yesterday, then set out on the further 60mile round trip to IKEA to buy bookcases (and also to scout out some bedroom furniture for us while we were there, an aspect of the cunning plan into which the OH hadn't been previously admitted).

 

We found the bookcases, located some extra shelves for them, made careful notes of their product numbers and location in the pick up warehouse. We looked at bedroom furniture and OH noted that the particular style that I liked tended to be flimsier and less well made than other styles. It was true. I was put out.

 

We wandered off to the warehouse area, on my part a sadder but wiser future purchaser of bedroom furniture and found where the bookcase packs were. OH took one look and said 'They'll never fit in the car'. I looked myself and was forced to concur. 60 miles, over an hour in the store and all we came away with was a jar of lingonberry jam as a thank you for the friend feeding the cats.

 

All is not lost because we can buy them on-line and a local carrier will pick them up and deliver them to us - for a not inconsiderable fee, which is what I was trying to avoid in the first place. Sigh!

 

On the up-side I have just written my 'to-do' list for tomorrow, and I don't see that I would have found the time to fill the shelves anyway; or at least I would have done, but only at the expense of something else, possibly more urgent. So I won't repine too much.

On the Eve of Departure...

...which sounds very poetic, but we're only going away for one night.

We are taking Son No 2 back down to the Glorious of Kingdom of Fife as college starts again for him on Monday. We could have sent him back via ferry and coach but I said it would be nice to take him back. This was not the result of overflowing mother love, although I do love him, naturally, but because I had A Cunning Plan.

 

Over the past couple of months as already noted I have been trying to turn his room into something  which resembles a proper bedroom rather more than it resembles a hamster nest. This has involved getting rid of some old dark and heavy furniture (most of which is destined to be recycled as shelving in The Big Shed) and replacing it with something lighter, more modern and less space consuming. It also meant moving the bed into a much more sensible position than Son No 2 had insisted on placing it way back when. It was also dependent on a lot of de-cluttering, which it was more than my life was worth to undertake myself. Because I'd have been guaranteed to chuck out something worthwhile and precious. So for a wee while each day since Christmas he and I have tackled the piles of Stuff. Some of it has gone. Some of it is safely boxed, ready to be taken to The Big Shed. And some of it is staying in situ.

 

Most of what is staying in situ needs to be on shelves, taking as it does the forms of PS games, Dvds etc etc and he currently has three small and totally insufficient sets of shelves for this purpose. We need much bigger shelves; in fact what this boils down to - in my mind at least - is that we need two large Billy bookcases from IKEA. There are only two branches of IKEA in the whole of Scotland and both are located in the Central Belt. I may have moaned about this here before. One  in Edinburgh and one in Glasgow and it is to the Edinburgh branch to which , dear reader, we are bound tomorrow.

 

Down one day and back the next:  we'll be exhausted by the  time we get home. And even more exhausted by the end of Sunday as OH will have to assemble the things and then I'll have to fill them. However it will then be a case of mission accomplished for that room and I can start haranguing the plumber, really nicely, on Monday about coming to finish off the  bathroom. As soon as he likes. If not sooner.  

And so, the turning year

turns once again. Well actually it turned a couple of weeks ago, and living here that's not just  a technicality. When we lived in the city and a lot further south then it made no difference, but up here you really are conscious of the shortening and lengthening of days on an almost daily basis. We really should celebrate New Year on 21st December and perhaps move Christmas to the end of the month.

 

I realise  that this would still mean the western world shutting up shop for two weeks solid, which I find irritating and inconvenient but to my mind it would make more sense.

 

And speaking of finding things irritating, one of my new year aspirations is to relax a bit more and go with the flow. This is so not me you wouldn't believe, but I might enjoy life more if I could think about it less. 

 

[Digression alert - That's a bit reminiscent of Knightley's words to Emma when he proposes to her 'If I loved you less I might be able to talk about it more' - this is in my mind because the TV seems to have decided that this was a Classic Christmas and gave us various versions of Emma, Persuasion and Jane Eyre to delight or disgust. I watched the Jane Eyre film simply to see the shawl on which my own M'Amie was based. I rejected the Paltrow/Northam and Garai/Lee Miller Emmas because I can't stand either of them, but indulged myself with the  Beckinsale/Strong version because I love it. ]

 

Meanwhile back at the junction of the Old and New Years OH and I had our traditional NYE snap, mainly because we disagreed about how horrible or otherwise 2013 has been. I said it had been an awful year and he disagreed. There again it wasn't him having nasty medical tests, panics about his vision and bone scans...anyway, regardless of what he says, I think 2013 was a bit of a naff year for me, but in an uncharacteristic onslaught of positivity I am determined to enjoy 2014. I do of course have a trip to my beloved Oz to look forward to in February which helps with the positive outlook. It will be three years since I was last there and I was quite poorly with a mixture of unpleasant things that time, so this time fingers crossed that I stay well.

 

And other aspirations? To study hard with great enjoyment, to be less catty and judgemental, to live more in the moment - and I think there was something in there about blogging more regularly too.

 

Happy New Year!