![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
We set off for Saltburn at 8.30 on Friday morning, half an hour behind schedule thanks to my mother's obsession with sniffing out as many odd jobs as possible to do before departure. Through the long drive up I navigated, keeping me ma updated on which roads to take next, and was also pressed into service passing sweets and other nibbles what seemed like every 30 seconds to her and my gran up front. (I was good and didn't touch the sweeties.) Can't grumble, though, as I did get to choose the in-flight music. We stopped for coffee at Chieveley - mum and gran were content with the flask they'd brought; I made a bee-line for Costa and their gorgeous iced mint lattes - and lunch at Leicester Forest East (a picnic of boiled eggs and fruit in Tupperware containers in their case; I hit KFC).
We arrived at the convalescent home where me ma's cousin Ray had arranged for all of us to stay at about 5.30 pm. Aunt Cynthia and Uncle Ron had arrived just before us, and of course Ray was on hand to welcome everyone, so once I'd checked out my room - nice enough and just like a single room in a small hotel - I went to join the early arrivals in the bar-lounge. It wasn't long before Sam and Mike arrived, and Sam bought me a drink; when I asked for a Magners, Mike said "How can you drink that stuff? It's paint stripper!" Sam is a cider aficionada herself but prefers Strongbow.
As more arrived, we all sat around making relaxing chat until Ray announced dinner time and we all went through to the dining room. After dinner we headed for the local community centre and saw a pretty good soul covers band. On our return to the home we piled straight into the bar-lounge, where we re-arranged the tables and chairs to form a huge circle for all two dozen of us.
Towards the end of the evening we attempted a game of Chinese Whispers, but the game had a fatal flaw : nobody ever said out loud what the message had turned into, they just kept passing the same message round and round. Not one message was ever read out, which, as my mother's cousin Pat (next to me) and I observed to each other, defeated the whole object. The unsurprising result was that chains simply died and were created at random. And more than once I saw my mother and Sam obviously conferring. Total chaos. There was the odd laugh, like my mother's cousin Eileen exclaiming "I AM NOT SAYING THAT!" prompting Ray to assert firmly "Cousin Eileen does not swear!" but with most of us never knowing what the message had been turned into it was all rather flat. One message was whispered to me by Pat as "Cousin Eileen's wearing a G string". Under the influence of five Magners, I made an honest mistake when I whispered it on to Gayle, changing "Cousin Eileen" to "Madam Aisleyne". You're not meant to earwig, but Pat immediately demanded of me "Did you change it then?" in a suspicious tone.
After the game had been brought to a halt by Aunt Jean announcing with her trademark haughtiness "We're not playing any more," I went over to my mother and Sam and asked if they'd been cheating. Me ma fessed up : they'd thought the messages were a bit boring so had been discussing how to spice them up. Sam shared my view about the fatal flaw.
We sat up till about 1 am all just catching up.
On Saturday I slipped out of the hotel just after nine to venture into town for a postcard for Ann. At 10.30 we boarded the home's minibus for a day trip to Whitby. We had a wander around the town then walked up the famous 199 Steps - once we'd done that we deemed ourselves to have earned our lunch. Several of us fancied the famous Magpie fish and chip shop, but Ray said it was over-rated and too expensive and recommended Mister Chips which he said was just as good. The shop's front proclaimed it to have won several awards. We bought our fish and chips and went over to a nearby fence by the water's edge to eat. After lunch some of us took a look at the Captain Cook museum, and after a mosey round the street market we mustered at the agreed assembly point in good time for the 4 pm pick-up...and waited and waited and waited.
As the bus still hadn't showed up by 4.30 the natives grew restless and some were talking about taking a train back to Saltburn, while Ray phoned the home and tried to establish what had happened. It turned out that Maxine, our driver in the morning, had dropped us in a different place from their usual Whitby pick-up/drop-off point. So Tom, the driver assigned to pick us up, had got to their usual pick-up point for 4 pm, hung around waiting for us till 4.20 then gone driving round the town. Finally they got a message to him to come and get us where we were - he arrived at 4.45.
Tom was most apologetic; we assured him it wasn't his fault. We were all just glad to finally be on the move. A few miles into the drive I texted Malc for the Hawks score : we'd drawn 1-1 and missed a penalty :( Meanwhile Yvonne was talking to a friend on the phone and learning that the local side, Middlesbrough, of whom both Ray and Trev the Shed are supporters, had lost 5-0 at home. That prompted Mike, an Aston Villa fan, to ask if I knew anyone back home who'd know the Villa v Portsmouth score. I rang Becky, who of course was gutted that Pompey had lost 2-0; news that was music to Mike's ears. He and I then had a general chat about footie.
In the evening we made the short walk from the home to a local pub restaurant. I sat next to Sam, with Yvonne and Mike opposite. An inquiry from Sam as to my culinary skills elicited the information that they are extremely limited, but seldom needed as I eat at the office during the week and grab a bite on the road with the girls on Sundays. Sam recommended I learn to cook more, as - fair enough - it's a useful string to your bow; she added that I'd then be able to cook for the whole family on Saturdays during these last few months in the parental home!
From there, she began to sneak in suggestions that, put together, amounted to going on a health kick. I alerted her to the spooky coincidence that my mother had made a (cack-handed) attempt at floating that same idea with me a week before. I then explained sadly that I really wasn't in a health kick mindset at the moment thanks to a case of the blues over my failure with Miss Sapphire. As Sam and I have always got on, I felt comfortable enough telling her how, after nineteen and a half years of unbroken disappointment in love, this time I was really hit hard and couldn't just pick myself back up yet again. We ended up having quite a heart-to-heart. I made sure I thanked her for listening, but she was fine about it all.
On a brighter note, the food (I went for chicken goujons followed by mint chocolate ice cream) was first class, and this (Saturday) was the only night of voting on Strictly, so Vanessa was able to text me the number to vote for Jade Johnson after all. She even sent me a message to confirm that Jade had survived, bless her.
Back at the home, after we'd formed our circle of seats again I headed for one of the comfy chairs only to be told by Aunt Cynthia that it was taken. She advised me that a chair opposite her was free, so I bagged it...to find it was the one Trev the Shed had earmarked for himself. He went and sat somewhere else; even after, moments later, I accepted Sam's invitation to move over and sit by her, Trev the Shed made constant references to my pinching his seat for the rest of the night.
Sam and Mike had a surprise for us once we were all seated : they'd rigged up a mike normally used for karaoke, and announced that we were having a talent contest. My mother chose the moment five minutes before she and her co-stars Pat and Gran were due to go on to ask if I had any suggestions for their act! Of course my mind was a complete blank. She added that they'd thought of Irish dancing or Three Little Maids. Knowing that me ma doesn't know the words to the Gilbert and Sullivan number, I advised them to go with Riverdance.
I was called up second, and sang Jasper Carrott's Daytrip To Blackpool - second cousin Graham shouted out that I should have done Daytrip To Whitby. Everyone either sang a song (many of the performances were complete train wrecks, but fair play to them all for having the bottle to get up and perform in front of everyone) or did a dance routine - I helped my mother, Pat and my gran along with their Irish dance by singing the Irish Hornpipe tune for them to dance along to. Yvonne was our star turn, giving a beautiful rendition of the 1968 Des O'Connor hit I Pretend. At the end we had the 'clapometer' (Sam and Mike naming each act and gauging the volume and enthusiasm of the applause): Yvonne deservedly won, I came second and gave her a congratulatory handshake and peck on the cheek.
A few, in dribs and drabs, drifted off to bed from that point on, while the hardy souls remained in the bar-lounge listening to the home's CD collection and, with the aid of the mike, having a sing-along. As we were in the North East, towards the end I led a rendition of The Blaydon Races. Perhaps fortunately Ray, who earlier had been winding up one of the bar's clientele for being a Geordie, had turned in by then; those Teessiders in our party who were still in the bar joined in happily enough.
Sunday we took the minibus down to Marske and walked the five miles along the sands back to Saltburn for a pub lunch. Some crazy souls doffed their shoes and socks and went paddling in the waters quite some distance. A couple of people wrote messages in the sand with stones, so I did one of my own : HWFC LADIES RULE - GOOD LUCK 2DAY GIRLS.
The pub, happily for Sam and me, served both Magners and Strongbow. We had the upstairs dining room booked, and it had been laid out for us in rather posh fashion. Ray was on our table, and mentioned that he'd seen some of Strictly the night before - he reckoned Jade Johnson had a bit too athletic a physique to look quite right as a dancer, so I observed that I've always fancied her, which diverted Ray onto his own celebrity crush - Babs from 1970s dance troupe Pan's People. Ray's wife Wilma mentioned that Babs' husband, who's in show business himself, is coming to the theatre where she works soon, so Ray cheekily enquired "Can you ask him to bring his wife?" and said he'd be turning on the best suit, cologne and charm that night.
Once we'd washed down our dinner with a drink, and Ray had cheated at pool but still lost, it was time for more blooming walking, up an ascending path through trees to the town's bandstand, where we idly hung about for an hour or so as a brass band performance continued.
On the walk back to the home, after Mike had bought himself, Sam and me 'Gothic' cones from an ice cream van, I phoned Trev to find out how the girls had got on. His phone was off so I called on Becky again; she joyfully told me they'd won 3-0.
Back at the home, Mike whiled away the hour before evening meal teaching me the rudiments of snooker.
Evening meal was a nice carvery offering a choice of beef or pork. As it was our last evening there was a bit of a festive atmosphere about the meal, and my gran gave everybody little souvenirs - I got a wind-up woodpecker that sticks to the wall with a suction cup, and when wound up gives the appearance of pecking away at the wall. From there we repaired to the bar-lounge; a couple of people wanted to start a game of some sort, but most were in favour of simply having a relaxing drink and chat. Me ma did manage to persuade the others to have a quiz, and got me to read the questions out; Aunt Jean tried to take over, telling me we had to wait for this or that person to come back from wherever they'd gone before having the next question, but Sam did her best to shout her down and I was quite happy to go with Sam's wishes.
After I'd called for applause for the top three teams, Chris called out "I thought it was meant to be about taking part?" and me ma wanted to know who the wooden-spoonists were. On Pat and John being announced as having that honour with 7 points, and my calling for "A big hand for them for being good sports," Jacqui laughed "That's a polite way of putting it" and Jim made an L sign at them - I joked "Jim, your 7's upside down."
We had a couple more after that, and reached a consensus that since Pat and John have always had to travel quite a distance to the gatherings, next year we'll hold it in Scotland, making it a 5 or 6 day event. Their nearest airport is Aberdeen, so I've been tasked with looking up when the cheaper flights from Southampton to Aberdeen are, and briefed with which dates people can and can't do. With the long drive home next day, nearly everyone was in bed by 11.15; Sam bought me one more Magners and we stayed up on our own for a bit more of a chat.
In the morning, as we said our goodbyes, there was a general air of 'back to reality'; the arrival of a new group at the home while we were milling around seemed to accentuate that. The journey back was a quieter affair. Home in time to see most of Cliftonville v Linfield on Sky.
And then I was up at 4.30 this morning to return to work.
We arrived at the convalescent home where me ma's cousin Ray had arranged for all of us to stay at about 5.30 pm. Aunt Cynthia and Uncle Ron had arrived just before us, and of course Ray was on hand to welcome everyone, so once I'd checked out my room - nice enough and just like a single room in a small hotel - I went to join the early arrivals in the bar-lounge. It wasn't long before Sam and Mike arrived, and Sam bought me a drink; when I asked for a Magners, Mike said "How can you drink that stuff? It's paint stripper!" Sam is a cider aficionada herself but prefers Strongbow.
As more arrived, we all sat around making relaxing chat until Ray announced dinner time and we all went through to the dining room. After dinner we headed for the local community centre and saw a pretty good soul covers band. On our return to the home we piled straight into the bar-lounge, where we re-arranged the tables and chairs to form a huge circle for all two dozen of us.
Towards the end of the evening we attempted a game of Chinese Whispers, but the game had a fatal flaw : nobody ever said out loud what the message had turned into, they just kept passing the same message round and round. Not one message was ever read out, which, as my mother's cousin Pat (next to me) and I observed to each other, defeated the whole object. The unsurprising result was that chains simply died and were created at random. And more than once I saw my mother and Sam obviously conferring. Total chaos. There was the odd laugh, like my mother's cousin Eileen exclaiming "I AM NOT SAYING THAT!" prompting Ray to assert firmly "Cousin Eileen does not swear!" but with most of us never knowing what the message had been turned into it was all rather flat. One message was whispered to me by Pat as "Cousin Eileen's wearing a G string". Under the influence of five Magners, I made an honest mistake when I whispered it on to Gayle, changing "Cousin Eileen" to "Madam Aisleyne". You're not meant to earwig, but Pat immediately demanded of me "Did you change it then?" in a suspicious tone.
After the game had been brought to a halt by Aunt Jean announcing with her trademark haughtiness "We're not playing any more," I went over to my mother and Sam and asked if they'd been cheating. Me ma fessed up : they'd thought the messages were a bit boring so had been discussing how to spice them up. Sam shared my view about the fatal flaw.
We sat up till about 1 am all just catching up.
On Saturday I slipped out of the hotel just after nine to venture into town for a postcard for Ann. At 10.30 we boarded the home's minibus for a day trip to Whitby. We had a wander around the town then walked up the famous 199 Steps - once we'd done that we deemed ourselves to have earned our lunch. Several of us fancied the famous Magpie fish and chip shop, but Ray said it was over-rated and too expensive and recommended Mister Chips which he said was just as good. The shop's front proclaimed it to have won several awards. We bought our fish and chips and went over to a nearby fence by the water's edge to eat. After lunch some of us took a look at the Captain Cook museum, and after a mosey round the street market we mustered at the agreed assembly point in good time for the 4 pm pick-up...and waited and waited and waited.
As the bus still hadn't showed up by 4.30 the natives grew restless and some were talking about taking a train back to Saltburn, while Ray phoned the home and tried to establish what had happened. It turned out that Maxine, our driver in the morning, had dropped us in a different place from their usual Whitby pick-up/drop-off point. So Tom, the driver assigned to pick us up, had got to their usual pick-up point for 4 pm, hung around waiting for us till 4.20 then gone driving round the town. Finally they got a message to him to come and get us where we were - he arrived at 4.45.
Tom was most apologetic; we assured him it wasn't his fault. We were all just glad to finally be on the move. A few miles into the drive I texted Malc for the Hawks score : we'd drawn 1-1 and missed a penalty :( Meanwhile Yvonne was talking to a friend on the phone and learning that the local side, Middlesbrough, of whom both Ray and Trev the Shed are supporters, had lost 5-0 at home. That prompted Mike, an Aston Villa fan, to ask if I knew anyone back home who'd know the Villa v Portsmouth score. I rang Becky, who of course was gutted that Pompey had lost 2-0; news that was music to Mike's ears. He and I then had a general chat about footie.
In the evening we made the short walk from the home to a local pub restaurant. I sat next to Sam, with Yvonne and Mike opposite. An inquiry from Sam as to my culinary skills elicited the information that they are extremely limited, but seldom needed as I eat at the office during the week and grab a bite on the road with the girls on Sundays. Sam recommended I learn to cook more, as - fair enough - it's a useful string to your bow; she added that I'd then be able to cook for the whole family on Saturdays during these last few months in the parental home!
From there, she began to sneak in suggestions that, put together, amounted to going on a health kick. I alerted her to the spooky coincidence that my mother had made a (cack-handed) attempt at floating that same idea with me a week before. I then explained sadly that I really wasn't in a health kick mindset at the moment thanks to a case of the blues over my failure with Miss Sapphire. As Sam and I have always got on, I felt comfortable enough telling her how, after nineteen and a half years of unbroken disappointment in love, this time I was really hit hard and couldn't just pick myself back up yet again. We ended up having quite a heart-to-heart. I made sure I thanked her for listening, but she was fine about it all.
On a brighter note, the food (I went for chicken goujons followed by mint chocolate ice cream) was first class, and this (Saturday) was the only night of voting on Strictly, so Vanessa was able to text me the number to vote for Jade Johnson after all. She even sent me a message to confirm that Jade had survived, bless her.
Back at the home, after we'd formed our circle of seats again I headed for one of the comfy chairs only to be told by Aunt Cynthia that it was taken. She advised me that a chair opposite her was free, so I bagged it...to find it was the one Trev the Shed had earmarked for himself. He went and sat somewhere else; even after, moments later, I accepted Sam's invitation to move over and sit by her, Trev the Shed made constant references to my pinching his seat for the rest of the night.
Sam and Mike had a surprise for us once we were all seated : they'd rigged up a mike normally used for karaoke, and announced that we were having a talent contest. My mother chose the moment five minutes before she and her co-stars Pat and Gran were due to go on to ask if I had any suggestions for their act! Of course my mind was a complete blank. She added that they'd thought of Irish dancing or Three Little Maids. Knowing that me ma doesn't know the words to the Gilbert and Sullivan number, I advised them to go with Riverdance.
I was called up second, and sang Jasper Carrott's Daytrip To Blackpool - second cousin Graham shouted out that I should have done Daytrip To Whitby. Everyone either sang a song (many of the performances were complete train wrecks, but fair play to them all for having the bottle to get up and perform in front of everyone) or did a dance routine - I helped my mother, Pat and my gran along with their Irish dance by singing the Irish Hornpipe tune for them to dance along to. Yvonne was our star turn, giving a beautiful rendition of the 1968 Des O'Connor hit I Pretend. At the end we had the 'clapometer' (Sam and Mike naming each act and gauging the volume and enthusiasm of the applause): Yvonne deservedly won, I came second and gave her a congratulatory handshake and peck on the cheek.
A few, in dribs and drabs, drifted off to bed from that point on, while the hardy souls remained in the bar-lounge listening to the home's CD collection and, with the aid of the mike, having a sing-along. As we were in the North East, towards the end I led a rendition of The Blaydon Races. Perhaps fortunately Ray, who earlier had been winding up one of the bar's clientele for being a Geordie, had turned in by then; those Teessiders in our party who were still in the bar joined in happily enough.
Sunday we took the minibus down to Marske and walked the five miles along the sands back to Saltburn for a pub lunch. Some crazy souls doffed their shoes and socks and went paddling in the waters quite some distance. A couple of people wrote messages in the sand with stones, so I did one of my own : HWFC LADIES RULE - GOOD LUCK 2DAY GIRLS.
The pub, happily for Sam and me, served both Magners and Strongbow. We had the upstairs dining room booked, and it had been laid out for us in rather posh fashion. Ray was on our table, and mentioned that he'd seen some of Strictly the night before - he reckoned Jade Johnson had a bit too athletic a physique to look quite right as a dancer, so I observed that I've always fancied her, which diverted Ray onto his own celebrity crush - Babs from 1970s dance troupe Pan's People. Ray's wife Wilma mentioned that Babs' husband, who's in show business himself, is coming to the theatre where she works soon, so Ray cheekily enquired "Can you ask him to bring his wife?" and said he'd be turning on the best suit, cologne and charm that night.
Once we'd washed down our dinner with a drink, and Ray had cheated at pool but still lost, it was time for more blooming walking, up an ascending path through trees to the town's bandstand, where we idly hung about for an hour or so as a brass band performance continued.
On the walk back to the home, after Mike had bought himself, Sam and me 'Gothic' cones from an ice cream van, I phoned Trev to find out how the girls had got on. His phone was off so I called on Becky again; she joyfully told me they'd won 3-0.
Back at the home, Mike whiled away the hour before evening meal teaching me the rudiments of snooker.
Evening meal was a nice carvery offering a choice of beef or pork. As it was our last evening there was a bit of a festive atmosphere about the meal, and my gran gave everybody little souvenirs - I got a wind-up woodpecker that sticks to the wall with a suction cup, and when wound up gives the appearance of pecking away at the wall. From there we repaired to the bar-lounge; a couple of people wanted to start a game of some sort, but most were in favour of simply having a relaxing drink and chat. Me ma did manage to persuade the others to have a quiz, and got me to read the questions out; Aunt Jean tried to take over, telling me we had to wait for this or that person to come back from wherever they'd gone before having the next question, but Sam did her best to shout her down and I was quite happy to go with Sam's wishes.
After I'd called for applause for the top three teams, Chris called out "I thought it was meant to be about taking part?" and me ma wanted to know who the wooden-spoonists were. On Pat and John being announced as having that honour with 7 points, and my calling for "A big hand for them for being good sports," Jacqui laughed "That's a polite way of putting it" and Jim made an L sign at them - I joked "Jim, your 7's upside down."
We had a couple more after that, and reached a consensus that since Pat and John have always had to travel quite a distance to the gatherings, next year we'll hold it in Scotland, making it a 5 or 6 day event. Their nearest airport is Aberdeen, so I've been tasked with looking up when the cheaper flights from Southampton to Aberdeen are, and briefed with which dates people can and can't do. With the long drive home next day, nearly everyone was in bed by 11.15; Sam bought me one more Magners and we stayed up on our own for a bit more of a chat.
In the morning, as we said our goodbyes, there was a general air of 'back to reality'; the arrival of a new group at the home while we were milling around seemed to accentuate that. The journey back was a quieter affair. Home in time to see most of Cliftonville v Linfield on Sky.
And then I was up at 4.30 this morning to return to work.
no subject
no subject
Hope you're feeling better today *x*