Thanks goodness THAT's finished

I love to move house, but I hate the process. Even though on the actual day of moving I usually go to work and let others better qualified than me do all the huffing and puffing, there is still the lead up to it with endless packing-up-of-stuff and then the aftermath with the endless unpacking-up-of-stuff. But the joy of living in a new place takes some time to wear off, and this flat is REALLY new, having never been lived in before. I was in conversation with a friend yesterday who said he had lived in the same house for 18 years. That would be SO boring for me. I think Neil and I have lived in 7 different residences in 12 years, and that doesn't count the motorhome/campsite year. I expect we will get everything to our liking here then start getting twitchy again.
Anyway, we finally got to completion on Monday, and now we can relax....in between bouts of shelf up-putting, of course.

On the stuff of memories, and a great day out

I had a great day yesterday. I had a half-day at work (always very pleasing) and then met my sister Julia in Eastbourne for some retail therapy. It was the first chance we have had to talk alone and in person (rather than on the phone) since the start of her relationship troubles at the beginning of the year. She seemed to me to be very bouncy and full of good humour, and we had a most enjoyable, if small, spree......especially as she helped me choose, and then paid for, 2 lovely tops from Evans. Saw Darren Cohen in Eastbourne, and Kim (used to know him from the surgery) but no-one else I know.

We went for lunch in the Townhouse, and sat in the garden. It immediately rekindled a memory of being there with Neil one summer's day, (a few years ago now) when we had one of our spoof conversations. In this one, Neil confessed about an affair.....with a man! We discussed it all just loudly enough for everyone else to hear, and were gratified to see everyone taking a great interest. I hadn't thought about it since, until I walked in there yeterday. strange!!

Later we met in Battle and had a scrumptious meal in SI, and everyone (J&P, Linda and us) was very jolly and seemed very relaxed. 4 bottles of Pinot Grigot must have helped. Neil very busy at the moment and has a long day today, so we said 'No' to Champagne at Linda's and came home. Shame, I like a drop of the old Bubbly.

Lots to do. May drive to Portsmouth.

On Other People's Blogs

I love reading my diary, and often pick a choice moment out from history to read to Neil at bedtime. It's nearly as much fun as reading someone else's diary. I have always enjoyed that enormously, and think it is fascinating to have a glimpse into other people's lives. I enjoy books that are in diary form too. I particularly like the Blog (especially my sister's) as they are so immediate, and often deal in trivia or the minutiae of daily living. I have found that when I keep my diary EVERY day, it is full of these fascinating insights, as well as the more momentous events. Often though, I play catch-up, and realise that the minutiae have been lost in the mists (I mist up pretty quickly) and I can only remember BIG things. It maybe a feature of this Blog-site that it selects random blogs for reading if you wish, and I often do, and pick up on people ranting about politicians, or celebrating a birthday, or just chuntering on like this. GREAT!

On memory and er.......I forget

I remember seeing an episode of Grumpy Old Women recently which had me crying with laughter, as one of the participants described how she forgets the name of things. She wanted her husband to bring something in from the area outside the house, but for some reason could not summon up the word 'Garden' from her memeory. Well, I just fell about!! This happens to me so often, that I began to wonder if it was just me, but then I got news that it was happening all around me. Phew!
Except, that it, with my sister Julia. She has the most astonishing memory, quite clear, quite unforgiving. I was reading her Blog about mice at our family home. If her recollection is right, I was 12 before they disappeared as a result of the newly erected TV mast. Surely, I must have remembered something? Nope, not a mouse dropping in sight. (I DO remember the maggots at the bottom of the dustbin, as these were the days before bin liners, and I have hated dutbins ever since) So how come she remembers all this stuff and I don't? I used to think that it was a result of a lifetime of epilepsy medication and dreadful, mind wrenching seizures, but now I am not so sure. Other people seem to have the same problems. How come I can't remember the mice, but I can remember the feeling of having my socks put on? How can she remember things that I said and did, and I can't? It's a good job she does really.........half the family history would be shrouded in the mists of time if it were not for her clarity of memory. Of course, some things I would rather forget......
One thing I don't forget is my friends and family. I love to keep in touch with my nearest and dearest and over the years I have constantly phoned, written, sent birthday cards, E mails and swapped mobile phone numbers. Mostly this will elicit a response, which may keep going for a while, but eventually it fades out and you wonder if you have been totally forgotten. Take my friend Daphne. If I phone her, she will be delighted to hear from me. She will invite us to dinner at her house in Eastbourne. She will promise to keep in touch, and I won't hear from her again unless I phone and repeat the process. My friends and family are enormously important to me. I think that a love or a friendship is a vibrant, active thing..it has to be nurtured and taken out and played with regularly, or it will just fade away in the corner. So why don't people take more trouble with them? How long does it take to send an e mail or a text? Of course, enough people DO take the trouble to keep in touch, and that's great and keeps me buzzing. We even get regular calls from Greece.
Of course, if we all lived in familyville................

Statistics and Probability Twirly Stuff

There is one flat above my office. At the rear of the office is a small, private car park for the use of staff in our office (4 max), our clients and other visitors (varies, rarely more than one at a time) and, when we are not there, the cars of the upstairs residents and their friends. Because I live nearby, I often park in there, as parking in the street is dodgy and often impossible.

I was amazed to realise the other day, that there were only 2 cars parked there, mine and someone from the upstairs flat, and we both had car registration numbers beginning with 'P205'. This started me thinking about co-incidences and probability and I have been trying to work out the odds of two cars parking in the same private car park having the same 4 digits of registration number. The trouble is, I don't know how to work it out, or what information I need. I have found out that there are 27,028,000 taxed cars in UK. Of those, 1,854 have registration numbers beginning P205. That is a ratio of 14578:1. I do not know whether this information is relevant. I suppose I have to look at ALL the people with that number who could possibly have parked there at that time.. Do I? I dunno. Is there anyone out there who knows how to calculate this stuff?

The whole idea of coincidences thrills me. I sometimes think that there must be a parallel universe which bends near and far from us, and when it touches, we get a coincidence. That would explain sooo much. I mean, the way that Neil and I met was the result of a bizarre set of circumstances that would not normally all occur together. Because they did, I met the love of my life. Is is any wonder that people believe in fate, or a controllling deity?

Doesn't it make your brain go twirly? Does mine.

Things that make me feel that I'm mad

The song says...........'I said "who put all those things in your head, things that make me feel that I'm mad? and you're making me feel like I've never born"'The trouble with having spaces where a brain should be is that once the idea goes in, it makes you go all twirly until you can sort it out. The trouble with going to see my sister is that she is quite capable of filling me up with such twirly thoughts. Take this as an example:-She said (there's that song again) that there has been research done which says that children willingly, nay...intentionally.....adopt a role in the family. Therefore one will take on the role of 'eldest child', another the 'baby'. Now this is all very interesting, but is it true? And who said it? And can it be proved anyway? The whole point about theories is that they can, like statistics, be made to fit your argument by conveniently ignoring other scenarios. The idea that, as the youngest of 4 siblings, I somehow intentionally adopted the role of baby is bizarre. I contend that the position that you have in your family will, to a great extent, dictate the role you play, and this is foisted upon you from birth by your parents and other siblings. I also firmly believe that once the relationship has been established, that it will stay that way for the rest of your life. It doesn't matter what role you may play in the rest of your world, you will revert to the order dicated by sibling positioning whenever you are together in the same environment.
Crikey, this is interesting stuff!! I know that books galore have been written on the subject, and I have read one of them. Maybe I need to go out more. At least by writing this down, I have got rid of those twirly thoughts and have been able to clear my spaces out for the next info load.

Families: Who'd have 'em?

Well, I certainly would! What a joy it was to see my sister, brother-in-law and niece on Sunday. And to have my son and his girlfriend here too! It was almost perfect, but not quite. Perfection is Familyville. Now, everyone seems to think this is a VERY bad idea, but wait a bit........let me sell it to you. Sit back and imagine for a moment........
You buy/build a house. You live in it with your significant other and your child/ren. Child gets too big for boots, needs own space but loves mummy and daddy to bits and VV. So child buys/builds house next door to live in with significant other. This Sig Oth wants his/her brother/sister/cousin/aunt to live close by so THEY buy/build house in Familyville and so-on and so-on until you have ALL your relatives living round you but not WITH you. No more long journeys to visit Aunt Maudlin........just walk down the street. Birthday bashes are a doddle.....pop round the corner to the restaurant which is run by Uncle Fungle and his family. You wouldn't have to worry where your kids had gone, cos as long as they are in familyville, they would be with a relative. And finding a babysitter would be as easy as falling off a highchair.
Of course there are a few little problems with Familyville, and I am sure you will think of some, but as a concept, you have to admit it is brilliant! Maybe, in a sense, that is where we are at anyway, as I guess everyone is related to someone else if you go back far enough. Maybe my husband is really my 15th cousin 28 times removed. Maybe (and this is the dodgy bit) I am the 14th pale descendant of someone with a nasty streak. But, as the song says 'we are family'.
I still enjoyed seeing the family on Sunday. It is great to be able to laugh, cry, argue etc with them, knowing that they will still love me, whatever, and will want to see me again and laugh,cry,argue etc all over again. I think it is the sure and certain knowledge of this love that makes me such a keen supporter of Familyville. I mean, imported people (friends & lovers) don't have to make this commitment and you can never be 100% sure of them. Does that make me unlucky with my friends or lucky with my family?
Typing this Blog in Georgia, probably 12. Whoever thought that Times New Roman 10pt was a suitable default font for ANYTHING needs trepanning. Arial 10 is just as bad. Can't read it without a microscope, and it is Soooooooooooooooooo old-fashioned. First thing I did at my office was to change default font to something readable, and we currently use Tahoma 12, modern without being brash and big enough to read without specialist equipment.
Hey, I heard that the house next door to you is vacant................when can I move in?

On Sisters and kind people and being alone

Kind people. A bit like London Buses. You wait for ages then 2 come along at the same time. So there I am in my flat, on my own. Anyone who knows me also knows that I HATE being on my own. I mean...........what is the point? You have no-one to talk to, to moan at, to laugh with. No-one to see what you are doing. No-one to enjoy a CD with, or watch TV with. Existence is pretty pointless on your own..........thank goodness that for me it is only a temporary state, or I might be persuaded to buy a cat to talk to. As I was saying, there I was, on my own and my lovely son pops round, all sweaty from Kick-Boxing and didn't just stay a few minutes, but a very agreeable 45. Of course, while he is there, my equally lovely sister phoned for a chat and I had to say 'not now'.....which I hate doing to any kind people. (Last week I had 3 kind people contact me which resulted in 2 dinner dates and one, sadly, had to be refused until another time). Later I phoned my sister and had a heartfelt and heartwarming talk. She is the epitome of kindness, and after years of being my sister, seems to know just the right moment to inject a dose of reality, love, humour and common-sense. How sad to hear the news about her sweet cat Arietty, who has died after, it appears, ingesting some poison, despite the best efforts of the vet. It makes me wonder whether people who routinely poison cats and many other animals (as in Greece, for example) should be made to watch the suffering they cause. Maybe it would make a difference.
I am still home alone, but it feels different now. I have been reminded of the people who care about me, that they DO think about me and like to keep in touch. Makes me think about some of the alone people I know.......I think I will share some of this good feeling among them too.
Great stuff. Goodnight

Hot, Hot, Hot in Paradise

Well, I seem to have neglected my Blog lately.........its just so hot, it makes my brain go twirly. I am still resident in Greece, but this is about to change as I prepare to pack up and ship my life back to UK for a while.

It's funny, this paradise thing. When we arrived in Greece as part of our big European tour, it was nearly Christmas, and it was warm enough to spend Christmas day on the beach. Festivities included a beach barbecue. Now for a UK resident, this seemed like paradise. I hate the cold and wet. I loathe snow. I abhor wind and am frightened of storms. Here, by the beach, in the sun, with the temperature in the high 20's and the sea twinkling in the morning light, I thought I had found the place of my dreams. This, I told everyone, is where I am going to spend the rest of my days.

I think that all that sun must have affected my power of logical thought. If I had given just one hour to this process, I would have realised that a place that has winter temperatures in the high 20's was going to get pretty damn hot in the summer. By May, the midday temperature in the sun on my patio was in the high 30's, and I had turned into a recluse, going out only in the early morning or late evening, and spending the rest of the day in the comparitive cool of the house. Used to sitting outside in the long English summer evenings, I was disconcerted by the speedy onset of darkness here....about 1/2 an hour after sunset. Sitting outside in the cooler night air seemed a good option, except that the mosquitoes think likewise, and they want to sit on,and bite, ME.

And that's another thing......CREATURES! In my hour of logical thought, if I had one, I would have realised that any place that gets REALLY hot would be home to creatures that LIKE it really hot. So there are a geckos living in the house, snakes, scorpions and BIG lizards living in the garden and any number of wriggling, flying, stinging and biting things that just won't leave me alone. We have some nameless, possibly huge and violent, possibly small and creepy, creature living in our roof space, and I dread the day when he works out how to get into bed with me.

I found myself longing for English rain!! I want to live where, although there are creatures, they are known and mostly leave me alone (Why don't UK mozzies bite me?) Suddenly, paradise as a concept is suspect. Is there a place on earth where EVERYTHING is perfect? I imagine that I am going to have to compromise, wherever I settle. So I am coming back to England, I will be stoic about the unpredictability of the weather in return for a bit of nice rain and temperatures more suited for humans, rather than lizards.

Yesterday, the temperature on our patio in the sun reached 110 deg F. Enough is enough.

Wonderful Webcams

Although I am well over 1000 miles away from my son and heir, tonight we both managed to get our webcams and mikes working, and were able to see and talk to each other. Isn't that just the business? I don't think we have the best software, because both the images and the sound are delayed and jerky, but who cares? To be able to see him AND talk to him? Maybe I need a video phone next. mmmmmmmmm, now there's an idea...................

Musing on Coincidences and Cuppas

Up at 6am this morning, just as it is getting light. It is beautiful outside, and I took my first mug of tea and sat on the patio and listened to the dawn chorus. This time, and early evening are my favourite times outside, when the sun is mild and the air fresh. I sometimes wonder what I am doing living in the hottest part of one of the hottest countries in Europe! I seem to spend most of the day avoiding the sun!

Election fever seems to be hotting up and as I sat outside I mused.........this is something that has to be done at least once a day. My thoughts were all about coincidences, what strange things they are? It is easy to understand how some people think that there are external forces at work on our lives. Now who would have believed that actor Tony Booth, who was so funny as the Labour-supporting son-in-law of Alf Garnett in TV's 'Till Death Us Do Part', would end up being the Labour Prime Minister's father-in-law? And how come, when Neil yelled out 'What a Save!' at a football matchon the TV, I should just have placed 'Save' as my word for my computer scrabble game? Too many times to count, I would select a client's records on the computer at work (for no reason other than it was the next in line for routine checking) and that client would telephone, often for the first time in months. Weird! Sometimes I believe in a parallel universe that warps so close to our own sometimes that events cross over, other times I think this is just baloney and it is all just coincidence.

Another thing I mused on is the standard of tea-making amongst my family and friends. Now my sister and her husband believe that they make the best tea on the planet. So does my son. So does my husband. So do I. And we all make tea differently, using different types of tea and ways of making it. Neil and I went into a specialist tea restaurant in Dijon, early one morning when we were desperate for that first cuppa. From the 100's of teas on offer, we chose one most likely to suit......English Breakfast Tea. It arrived without milk, and even after prodding, was so weak it was almost a fortnight. It also came with delicate bone-china CUPS. We did the best we could, but I was tempted to inform the owner that no self-respecting English Tea-Drinker would drink this at breakfast. Breakfast tea should be a nice pleasing light-to-mid brown (kinda like beech furniture), should be served with milk and no sugar, and be in a MUG (bone china if you insist). This morning, I mused that this is only MY idea of a perfect morning cuppa, and that everyone I know probably has a different point of view. I am such a devoted tea-drinker that I enjoy a cuppa wherever, even gnat's in Dijon.

However, the drink-they-call-tea in Greece bears absolutely no resemblance to anything I recognise as such, and I avoid it. This leaves me in a quandary when it comes to selecting a hot drink when out and about, as I don't like coffee much and there isn't much else to choose. I tend to stick to cold drinks.. fruit juice or water mostly.

Time to get breakfast. Bye for now

Friday 22nd April 2005

Can't sleep. It's 05.40 and apart from me, the only other things awake here are the resident Geckos. When we first came here I would catch them and put them outside, but locals tell me they are a) harmless and
b) beneficial as they catch and eat mosquitos. Our Geckos are very small, probably no more than 4" head to tail, and they run and hide in the roof space when I put the light on.

Neil reckons he can hear them calling when all is quiet in here. However, I am not sure Geckos make a noise and can't find out. Anybody know of a decent website 'everything you wanted to know about Geckos but were afraid to ask'

Thursday 21st April 2005:- Starting Out

Having read my sister's Blog, I thought I would have a try at my own.

Why Sossij Sandwich I hear you ask? Well, Sossij is my internet identity, based on the nickname given to me by my dearest husband Neil. And I firmly believe that almost anything that is good to eat tastes better in a sandwich. The sandwich is quite probably the cure for anything that is wrong with the world, but it has yet to be put to the test. I mean, how can you harbour murderous thoughts whilst tucking in to a peanut butter and marmalade sandwich?