What did you say?

Another bloody awful day, weatherwise, though this morning I did manage to get into town to have my hair cut. It was beginning to look rather 'wet dog', so a cut was overdue. Trevor Sorbie's is a very relaxing place to visit. Apart from the usual fresh coffee or tea, you can have a glass of wine if you want (too early for me), and they offer head massage as part of the shampooing experience. The girl who cuts my hair is called Morgan and is probably about twenty. They're all so confident, and competent, that I'm very impressed. And they're all so gorgeous. It makes me long for the days when I used to swan into Vidal Sassoon in Sloane Street, when I was young and gorgeous too. I could wear what I liked, have my hair any colour I liked, and turn heads wherever I went. Ah well.. I may be invisible now, but I can remember when I wasn't.

The rest of the day has been spent filling in forms and checking details on the Contract for the flat sale. There is so much paperwork - I can't remember that it was this bad only five years ago - but at least we don't have to do the new HIP. Of course it falls to me to do this - Son just doesn't have the time and it would all take far too long if it was left to him.

Ebayers are biting on some of my listed items. Jolly good. It's just great to get rid of some of the stuff I've collected over the years. And it's fun checking out what other people are selling too. Not that I'm tempted to buy anything - the only thing that tempts me now is Designer clothes - fat chance!

Terry Wogan had a lot of fun this morning with the announcement that Hearing Tests could become compulsory for the over fifty-fives. How do they work out this arbitrary age? Does one's hearing automatically fade at this stage? Can't say I've noticed - although Daughter does sometimes say "Mum, you're deaf!" This is usually
when I'm either not concentrating on what she's saying, or not wanting to listen - it's entirely selective as far as I'm concerned. I do remember though, that when Daughter was very young she had quite severe hearing problems. Without me realizing it, she had learned to lip-read at the age of about four. I only discovered this one day when she had her back turned to me and didn't hear me calling her. My voice got louder and louder, until I panicked and shouted - still she didn't hear me. I had to get in front of her, holding onto her arms, before she was aware I was even calling her. When we went to the Doctor, he assured me that this is quite common - children can adapt in the most astonishing ways to a disability. I was appalled that I hadn't noticed, but there it was! She went on to have all sorts of tests and then three lots of gromits before the ears were finally sorted out - and the final set of gromits were done just before she went to University, so the problem persisted for years, and caused her many problems. At one stage, when her 'Glue Ear' was very bad, the specialists were predicting that she would be quite deaf quite soon (I think she was about 10 at the time). Luckily, though, this prognosis proved false and she can now hear perfectly well. But I noticed that when we took Grandson for his hearing test a couple of months ago, she was very nervous! I guess she was reliving her experiences and hoping that the problems hadn't been inherited. No worries - he came through it with flying colours and gave the Doctor a funny look when the old buffer couldn't keep up. No flies on my Grandson!