Where there's a Will...

      I just thought  I could squeak in another post before the end of the month, and here it is! Today has been cold, windy, rainy -  and very trying for me. I had arranged for a Legal man to come and help me write a Will, something I have been successfully avoiding  for a good few years. I looked in my document box last night and discovered the last one I wrote which was in 1988. It was the year after we moved to Cambridge, when my children were still young (9 and 7) and there was a lot of complicated stuff going on in our lives. I had recovered from the brain tumour and we were happily settled in our new house, but it had been traumatic to say the least. Anyway, what I discovered when I found the Will was that I had signed it but not had it witnessed! As it turned out it hadn't mattered because here I still am - and also it was a registered copy,  not the original which I assume is still sitting tight in the old Solicitor's office! What a  palaver, but we sat  here for an hour and a half at the end of which  I had a draft Will and a possible Power of Attorney too. Enough said - and I spent the rest of the day feeling rather overwhelmed by it all. It's expensive too, but I guess it removes any anxiety for my Children when the inevitable happens.
      What a day, and something I don't want to repeat really. And just to cheer me up further, I had a letter from the Eye Hospital confirming that I need  three more eye injections, and casually mentioning that my eyes have deteriorated a bit since they were last examined. Oh bugger, it seems I am gradually falling apart.
      I'll just say goodbye to June, and to you, for now...Let's hope for a better July.

Another Heat Wave...

      This week has been another very hot one, overall. We had a couple of days when it was hotter here in England than in Majorca and Ibiza, which  is all very well but we are not all on holiday and heading for the beach,  Oh wait though, that's exactly what did happen - the mindless majority did apparently do precisely that. I do wonder that anyone can consider this to be ok behaviour when a couple of weeks ago we were all obeying the instruction to stay safely at home!! I'm afraid I put the blame firmly on Boris Johnson for allowing the ghastly Dominic Cummings to flout all the rules, do precisely as he pleased and get away with it. The fact that many people are having unbounded beach parties,dancing in the streets and being encouraged to drink in pubs again is directly attributable to Cummings' behaviour. Have we already forgotten the fact that during lockdown he was spotted (and filmed) dancing to Abba in the garden at his parents' house, and that next day he celebrated his wife's birthday with a visit to Barnard Castle? And then drove all the way back home to London after he had finished his family celebrations. Just multiply this behaviour - firmly supported by the Prime Minister - by hundreds of thousands (they can all read after all - or mostly) and you can see where the current attitudes have come from. You'd better duck Johnson, because the mud slinging will eventually come your way. At least I fervently hope it will.
      I did go to the beach on one of our hot days, as I was longing for a swim. I left it until about 5pm but there were still quite a few people on Shoreham Beach. No problem social distancing though, and I had a lovely cold splash in the sea before I came back to cook supper. Big Grandson was here again and we had a very companionable time. It is all a bit like Groundhog Day though: the weeks are  much the same and here we are nearly at the end of June.
      Today we have some very welcome rain, and I have purple flowers on my climbing bean plant and white flowers on my strawberry plant. Still no flowers on the nasturtiums though, and I'm just about keeping the blackfly at bay. Another day in Paradise...
       

Eyes Right!

      This week has been almost normal so far -  and it's only Wednesday. On Monday I was  summoned to the Brighton Eye Hospital for a check on my right eye which is afflicted with AMD (Age-related Macular Degeneration). I had been due for a check up in February just as we were beginning to be really aware of the Corona Virus, so my appointment had been postponed. Anyway I had not been back and it was long overdue. I have to admit to being very nervous, not only because the eyes have been a bit blurry, but also because I worried about the condition getting worse. Luckily
though the opinion was that there had been some improvement after the last course of treatment, and they recommended three more injections in the eye over a three month period. All the eye tests, scans and examinations were done without fuss and I have to say that the doctors and nurses were all wonderful: very efficient, kind, thoughtful and, without exception, from the BAME community. It was a sobering experience which made we realise just how much we owe to these people who work for our NHS, which is (at the moment) free and without equal. I made sure to thank each  and every one who treated me and left feeling rather blessed. I  just hope our Government will reward them properly in the future - it's all very well clapping them, but a decent pay rise is long overdue.
      My little garden is crying out for some rain. The roses are all in bloom and looking lovely, but everything is desperately dry. I keep on watering, but they need some proper rain. I'm trying to grow a few edibles, Climbing beans and nasturtiums are climbing well, but the spinach seeds just disappeared  and my strawberry plants are all leaf  and no flower. So far it's a B minus I'm afraid.
      Big Grandson is staying with me for a few days and we are looking forward to watching a bit of football this evening. We are having spaghetti Bolognese and strawberries and ice cream for supper, and will no doubt be glued to the TV. Manchester United are playing and I guess young Marcus Rashford will get a special cheer because of his successful venture into politics in getting the dreadful Boris to agree to feed hungry schoolchildren in the Summer Holidays. Good for him! He grew up with a single-parent Mum and was one of five children, so he knows what he is talking about.
      What a lovely young man!

June is bustin' out all over...

      Those of you who are my vintage, or thereabouts, will recognise the reference and will  realise that I have been indulging in old Hollywood films in my spare time. I did watch Guys and Dolls (see above) and also Carousel, which reduced me to a sobbing wreck!! I know - how could that happen, but I was obviously at a low point and the pathos of the story just got to me. It took me a whole hour to get through the sobbing, after which I felt better. I suspect we are all behaving a bit irrationally at the moment, and letting it all out is probably the best thing. Of course I am  mostly on my own, so there is no-one else to see my collapses - probably for the best.
      The general mismanagement of the Corona Virus Pandemic seems to be going on without pause - I really despair of this Government and the bunch of misfits who seem to be runnning the show. What are we supposed to do - just watch? The latest dreadful drama is the killing of a black man by a policeman in America -  which has enraged the whole world just about. That this kind of thing can and does still happen anywhere in the world is a matter for our collective shame. How can we ever justify this kind of behaviour? It makes the cheerful, musical America of the Fifties look like a complete farce - technicolour it may be, but examine it closely and you see that everyone (yes everyone) is white, young-ish and living a carefree Yankee-doodle life. It really should make us sick.
      I think I'll just stop now and get on with  my supper,  the state of the world is not a joyful one, and makes me feel ashamed. I'm certainly ashamed to be British and would never condone the dreadful attitudes of  "people" like Farage and Gove, Cummings and Rees Mogg. Please god let them all go away!!