Birthday happiness

July 2020

In the week leading up to my birthday I signed up to an online Buddhist retreat, to be undertaken at home. Usually a retreat takes you away from all mundane cares, with nothing to worry about except trying not to be late for meals and the scheduled sessions, and there aren't all that many of those. On the other hand, at home there's still all the usual stuff to be done, and in my case many tradesmen to communicate with, and it was difficult to separate myself from phone and Internet and TV. 

I also signed up too late to be able to take time off work so I missed the sessions on Monday and Tuesday, and as well as work there were still my usual evening meetings on Monday and Tuesday, and I had a pre-existing meeting on Wednesday. The retreat sessions were recorded and available through a web page, but I never did catch up. It was a very full week.

The day before my birthday Lola II and Mr M and I went to see mum and dad, and I brought shopping from Lidl which mum misses above all things. The weather was perfect so we could sit outside, and we brought our camping stoves and cooked our own lunch. I went home with Lola II and Mr M and we ordered takeaway Japanese food in the evening, and took part in the latest scheduled Zoom meeting with friends - a quiz.

Lola II and Mr M gave me some plum chutney made from their home-grown plums which I'm looking forward to trying. Such a shame that their grape vine has died, I really enjoyed the grape jam, although the diet doesn't really allow for much jam at the moment. I'm still losing weight but more slowly - 5.7kg down now, and hoping for just 1kg more. I started the diet because my clothes were too tight and I didn't want to have to go shopping for new ones, so there's little point in reaching a situation where I have to go shopping because my clothes are too loose.

The weather for my birthday was as lovely as the previous day, and as I chatted to the man behind the fish counter at Waitrose about it and mentioned that it was my birthday, he stuck a label on my purchase indicating that it would be free of charge! Then when I arrived home I noticed a skip outside my neighbour's house which had a couple of bar stools in it. They looked a bit dusty but seemed intact, and were a perfect match with my existing bar stools and the colour of my kitchen walls. It has occasionally been awkward having only three stools, so I took one out and cleaned it up (with permission from the skip owner who is having a clear out before moving away). 

And so endeth the birthday, with a fish supper, while sitting on a stool, enjoying the glorious sunshine of a lockdown summer.