New Year, New Variant

Great Dixter, July 2020

It's been an unsocial yet comfortable time at Lola Towers over the Feast Days - I allowed myself quite a lot of chocolate and ended up feeling slightly sick, which is a first. When all the plans made for this time period had to be called off and I wasn't at work I reverted to hibernation mode, broken only by phone and Zoom calls with friends and family. I even made the effort to get dressed, just for these highlights.

Given the long stretch of nothing over several days, I managed to tackle a job that has been waiting literally for years - my Lasting Powers of Attorney for both health and finance. While not all that difficult to create given that the Government website sets it all out in a very straightforward way, the main barrier is with the 'Certificate Provider' (who agrees that I'm sane and not being put under pressure) and the witnessing arrangements, given that we're not supposed to meet indoors and I don't want to involve anyone at work.

Then I got ambitious and embarked upon another long-postponed task - the Advance Decision (or Living Will) which outlines my wishes should I lose mental capacity but need life-prolonging treatment. Alongside that lives the Advance Statement, which gives all my preferences should I reach that state of loss of capacity, so why not do that at the same time? And, since my divorce was finalised in November, why not look at my Will as well?

Since nothing else was going on I knuckled down and printed all the paperwork ready for signing. 

On Monday I'd been so bold as to arrange a socially distanced walk. Surely that couldn't be called off? and no, it wasn't. Three of us wrapped up warm - snow flurries were forecast. A whole lot of other people had the same idea, the paths were two inches deep in mud, and there was quite a lot of dodging around puddles and people and avoiding getting pebbledashed with mud from all the loose dogs. My two companions were also kind enough to sign and witness all the legal documentation, which was no trivial task. And it felt good to go outside even though my knee started to complain towards the end of the walk.

I had been feeling bad from not moving enough - both my body and my mind start to complain when I've been sitting down too much. I've mentioned before that my knee was playing up and I couldn't run any more, so I had the great idea to do a bit of skipping, with the bonus that it can be indoors. It seemed to go well and the knee didn't hurt at all, but it turned out that I was using muscles that hadn't seen much action since badminton stopped ten months ago. I was crippled for nearly a week afterwards.

So that's the end of a pretty bad year, when isolation and solitude (usually my good friends) conspire to turn me into a recluse, relieved only by going to work, seeing mum and dad, and Zoom calls with friends, family and Buddhists. There has certainly never been another year like it, but we will have to wait and see how soon the vaccination programme will make a difference, and what that difference will be.

Spanish holiday part 2: Pilgrimage

Camino del Norte, September 2018

Deba was the starting point of our actual pilgrimage to San Sebastian along the Camino del Norte. It was a little tricky finding the path to get started, and we were concerned for our onward progress when almost immediately we met a long-haired Jesus lookalike complete with wooden staff who stopped to talk to us at length. We imagined spending most of the route fending off other pilgrims going in the 'right' direction - we were going the 'wrong' way - but in fact he was the only devotee of the true path that we encountered.

A jolly party of Germans formed an arch of walking poles for us to walk through at one point, and there was the French couple who were walking the whole route and onwards home to France and had started about three weeks previously, and then there were the Americans who had rented bikes which they must have had to carry most of the way - hardly any of the path was in a fit state for cycling. Non-human encounters included the cat with a studded collar who complained loudly when we didn't wait for it, and the quizzical cow that I featured in a previous blog post.

We spent three days walking, and they were hard days, particularly the first when it drizzled just enough to make the steep muddy slopes too slippery to climb or descend easily - one such slope provided a rope to hang on to that helped us down. Thanks to J's satellite navigation and sports app, we know that we covered 14.5km including 728m ascent that day. By early afternoon we reached one of the significant geological sites on the route: a beach containing an exposed rock formation known as Flysch. We climbed about and took photos for a bit, but time was pressing and by the time we reached Zumaia we were definitely tired. Unfortunately our accommodation in a 'bungalow' on a campsite was a little way out of town and a long way uphill, but we were consoled by the thought that there would be a cafe on site.

There was a cafe on site, but it was closed. Never mind, they offered to supply us with pizza! And we could buy beer and snacks in the shop! After a lengthy introduction to the site Rules, which strongly emphasised their ecological credentials to the point that they were not going to give us a towel each (think of the damage we might do to the planet with a towel if we were not forced to share), we trudged even further uphill to the 'boongalo'. It was small with two rooms we'd already agreed to share, but to get hot water in the shower required the sink tap to be turned on at the same time and even then it wasn't very reliable. Mr M started to feel very ill at that point, and he generously allowed us to share his streaming nose, sneeze and cough for the rest of the holiday as one by one we succumbed.

Lola II was dispatched to collect the pizzas at the appointed time, and she returned with only three instead of the four we had ordered. She had watched as the four sad, frozen pizzas were put in the oven, and watched again as three had been transferred to the boxes and the fourth slowly slid onto the floor (a replacement was delivered to the door some time later). This was definitely not the best meal of the holiday, but we were tired and hungry (and in Mr M's case, ill) and we retired early.

The next day we were booked for lunch in a fancy fish restaurant in Getaria. The seaside town was rather lovely and had an interesting church, and were it not for the need to make progress I would have liked to spend more time there. The fish was good too. Our next stop was at a cafe on the sea front in Zarautz, and we made good time to arrive at our overnight stop in Orio, looking forward to anything but pizza. The booking had been changed at short notice to a pension on the edge of town which turned out to be lovely, and very luxurious compared with the boongalo. It wasn't as difficult a day as the first - further in distance (18.2km) but much less ascent and descent. We got ourselves clean and tidy and set out to find provisions for the evening.

For some reason, there were no cafes or restaurants open in the whole of Orio on that Tuesday night, and we looked quite hard. Eventually we decided to stage a picnic and bought bread and cheese and meat and olives and fruit and cakes, and prepared to take them back to our room - but the cheese was in a large, hard lump, and due to having brought cabin luggage only on the flight over we had nothing that would serve as a knife. Luckily we had struck up a conversation with the server in the bakery, so we went back there and they kindly lent us a knife to cut up the cheese.

The third day of walking was the shortest (13.35km) but still with significant climbs. We indulged Mr M by agreeing on a detour that would take us to Monte Igueldo for our first sight of the beautiful bay of San Sebastian. Monte Igueldo is the location of San Sebastian's 'amusement park', and thus charged a fee for us to go in even though none of the rides was open. I have never seen a sadder amusement park, except perhaps in Scooby Doo cartoons. The view of the bay and the ice cream we ate there were both very lovely though. We had arrived! Now for the Film Festival...

Photo credits: all except the top one were taken by Mr M.

The build-up to the building

Shipley Church, September 2017

What a week. I've been clearing out the kitchen properly because of the building work starting very soon, and I've set up the alternative kitchen in the living room to try it out. It's working OK and I'm sure I shall soon start to remember where the bin and the kettle are now located. Mugs are on the shelf with the CDs, cereal is in the cupboard with the music system, decaff teabags are in the next room and I've bought several packets of biscuits because I'm assuming builders eat biscuits and I want them to like me so they will do a really good job.

Meanwhile there have been some extra stresses at work. On Monday one nurse and the doctor were both ill, and the remaining team was led by a nurse who, let's say, is not an enthusiastic worker. So she made the receptionist cancel all the patients for the day, and the doctor was not pleased when he found out. The nurse won't care, though.

More kitchen clearing on Tuesday, then on Wednesday I went to a meeting convened by Diabetes UK and NHS England all about self-management through Structured Education. I really, really need to think more carefully about whether I should go to these meetings. It was attended by several people working for Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) from different areas in the West Midlands, and by 'service providers' like myself.

I listened to an account of a really good way of delivering self-management education to people with Type 2 Diabetes in Worcestershire, while thinking how it could never happen in my region because all the key people are all too busy picking fights with one another. But I spent a bit of time talking to one of our Senior Commissioners, but there are so many administrative layers between that level and my own that it really seems to make no difference to me what is decided at the top, and similarly there seems to be no accountability to Commissioners about what I decide to do. It just frustrates me that I don't understand how the system works and nobody seems able to explain it to me.

Evening activities added to the running about that I did, with the usual badminton (including the first match of the new season), my new Buddhism class (more about that soon), and, unusually, some social activities.

On Friday I went to a Charity Music Quiz in aid of one of my colleagues who has been diagnosed with terminal cancer. It's a very sad story: she and her family were devastated by the diagnosis and did what many families in their position would do - clutch at straws. Faced with their oncologist's pessimistic prognosis they found a clinic in Germany which offered a treatment costing £50,000 for the first cycle (I think three cycles were recommended) after an initial fee of £17,000 just to look at the biopsy samples.

So they embarked upon a massive fundraising effort including local newspaper and radio coverage and many events and sponsored activities. Thankfully during this period the oncologist was persuaded to do a bit of research on their behalf, and an alternative but comparable treatment has been found in this country for a lot less money. But still a lot of money.

The quiz was part of this fundraising effort, and although it was on a Friday night with colleagues from work, both of which would normally have meant I would have taken care to avoid it, I signed up for the sake of my colleague. It wasn't a bad evening, and our team did quite well - I even contributed one or two answers. There was a raffle at the end which landed me a bottle of gin, but there were ten rounds in the quiz plus the raffle and I didn't get home until midnight.

The weekend was full of preparation for the builders squeezed in alongside more social events. Astonishingly, I found someone who wanted the kitchen cupboards! So on Saturday I welcomed a man and his nephew with their not-very-capacious estate car, who proceeded to take all the cupboard doors and a couple of the shelf units. Despite seeming a little suspicious about the whole deal at the start, by the time they drove off I was invited to drop in to visit any time I happened to be in their neighbourhood.

My monthly music group was on Saturday afternoon, and then in the evening I went to a local venue because a friend was playing a gig there - another late night (but not as late as the quiz night), and a walk on Sunday with the Meetup group which was delightful. The weather was so warm that we could sit outside at the pub stop, and after the walk I visited Charlecote Mill - a working water mill which was having an open day. So another long day, then back to work on Monday, more badminton on Monday night, and then...

The Builders Arrived.

More progress

Tusmore Estate, April 2017

Nothing special to report for the last few weeks, although I've been having a good time. We had a family gathering on mum+dad's 60th wedding anniversary, which in true family style was celebrated by nothing special at all other than all of us being there. I have done a few of the jobs on my list that have been waiting for quite a long time, including meeting the new landlord of the Pub Next Door, buying house insurance, and putting up the last curtain in the new office/spare bedroom space which can be drawn across to separate the two 'rooms'.

The upstairs space is now structurally finished, but furniture needs to be brought upstairs which will need the help of some burly individuals who can help me move a filing cabinet, desks (one from downstairs to upstairs and the other in the opposite direction) and a bookcase. That will, I think, complete the office move, except for deciding what to do about the noticeboard.

More on the LTRP front - I now have working drawings to give the kitchen suppliers and builders, and I have sought alternative quotes. The alternative builder has so far not responded at all, and the alternative kitchen supplier was very scathing about my washing up preferences! She did however come up with the useful suggestion that my next step might be to settle on the appearance of the floor. I am going to have a vinyl option called Karndean, and I drove to the main Karndean showroom in Evesham, which was well worth the trip. I came away with three different samples large enough to make a choice at home, and the confidence that any one of them would do nicely.

Oh yes, I have been to see H+B in the North West along with Lola II, Mr M and Sister D, and we all made ourselves thoroughly at home over lunch. We were hoping to do a bit of walking in the afternoon, but the weather put a stop to that. I took the opportunity of visiting our Postal Mechanisation guru on the way home, since he also lives in the North West. He was very kind and welcoming even though it was Good Friday, which is just as well because we spent nearly five hours (FIVE HOURS) going through another three boxes of material that mum had unearthed. I got home at 2 a.m.

However, I had to agree with Lola II, Mr M and Sister D that I was spending too much time on this stupid ebay project. Although I find it mildly enjoyable, the time spent for meagre financial return is simply not worth it, and I have plenty of other more enjoyable occupations that I have no time for. So the plan was that I would go through the new stuff with the PM guru but would ask him to dispose of anything of value, and throw away everything else. This is what I did, so now I am only going to finish auctioning the material I already had. There is one box remaining, so it will still take a month or two.

I spent a day at the Birmingham Buddhist Centre doing meditation, listening to lectures, talking to all sorts of people and then watching a kind of ritual that is the closest buddhists seem to get to formal 'worship'. The thought most prominent in my mind was 'I can't imagine ever joining in with that', but who knows? They are a thoughtful and sincere group of people and I have a lot more in common with them than with any of my work colleagues and many of my friends.

Over the Easter break, as well as the northern excursion I did another ten mile walk with the Meetup group I joined for the New Year walk. The walk leader this time set a rather fast pace, and by the end my legs were aching and I'd also managed to acquire an impressive blister on my little toe. If I sign up for another long walk I'll have to watch out for who's leading, but in fact I'll probably stick to the five mile options in future. The picture at the head of the blog was taken on the route, but the estate is privately owned so we didn't go in and I don't exactly know what the buildings are.

Lastly, badminton news: Club #2 held an end-of-season tournament (they don't play over the summer) and I won the top lady prize. While you may think this indicates my advanced badminton skillz, you should consider the alternative explanation, which is that I have chosen to play in a club containing players who are significantly older and significantly less fit than I am. But I was runner up for the past two years, so it's still rather nice to win something.

North Oxfordshire, April 2017

Several new beginnings

Walking in the Cotswolds, January 2017

The New Year has started in the most terrific way, at least after the noise from the pub died down so I could get to sleep. Incidental news - Smurf has announced on Facebook that he's stepped down from running the pub, so I need to get over there and find out who my neighbour is now, and what's going on.

Anyway, I started the year proper with a parkrun, but forgot my barcode. This means that my run isn't logged against my name in the big parkrun database and I have to do an extra run to get to my Big Numbers (you can have a special T-shirt when you've done 50). I thought I would be a bit peeved, but it didn't matter. I just felt happy to be out there. Even though it was pouring with rain all the way round.

Starting the day with a parkrun generally means I don't do much for the rest of the day, and this was certainly true for New Years Day. However, I had finally joined Meetup, which is a website that allows people to create groups around particular interests and activities and then recruit others to join them. I joined the 'Out and About in Warwickshire' group and signed up to a long walk in the Cotswolds that took place on Monday. It was bright and sunny and even a little bit warm out of the wind, and the walk was wonderful and all the other people I talked to were lovely. Really lovely. Someone saw me just grinning with pleasure, and commented that the endorphins were very evident.

The highly unexpected bonus of all this unusual socialising was that one of the people I met turned out to own a kitchen design business. This kitchen project has been weighing me down a bit, being a lot more difficult than I was expecting, so the prospect of actually finding someone prepared to help was such a relief. I need to get along to her shop.

During the Christmas/New Year lull (Twixtmas) I finally got to grips with starting to list dad's collection of ephemera on ebay. It's very time-consuming - each listing has to have at least one photo, I need to check for similar items previously listed and/or sold so I can get an idea of how much to charge (I've mostly been putting on fixed price listings) and then work out postage. Even the description is tricky when I don't really know why anyone would want a manufacturer's leaflet about a Third Generation Coding Desk or a Philatelic Presentation Pack Assembler in the first place, let alone a poster exhorting you to use the postcode or celebrating 350 years of the Royal Mail in 1985. So I took a load of photos and got a load of listings ready in draft, all the while thinking "what's the point", and who'd have thought it, someone went and bought one. And now another two (same buyer)! So I'm carrying on and watching the pence flood in (we have made just over a fiver so far).

Good riddance

Wastwater, December 2015

The year end approaches, and reflection on the past year is often indulged in at this time.

2015 has mostly been a bit rubbish. But not quite all of it.

I have read 54 books (and another two on the go at the moment).

I am currently having a lovely walking holiday in the Lake District with friends. Despite all my supposed fitness achieved from running and badminton, my legs suffered a bit of a setback due to an enormous steep downhill stretch, and I had to take it easy the following day. Luckily the worst weather arrived on that day, so I didn't miss much. Unfortunately I took part in another epic walk the next day and now my left knee is officially defunct. My badminton team will be almost as cross as I am.

My family has had a mixed year, and dad is still recovering from an operation intended to relieve various unpleasant symptoms. The stairlift has provided much cause for discussion and debate in the last few months. Lola II and Mr M are well, but are in the doghouse because they abandoned me to spend New Year in Seattle with other family members.

Work has been mostly interesting and enjoyable, although there are frequently issues that demand no little amount of forbearance. The vacant Dietitian post has now been filled and we are in training mode with the new incumbent. We may be getting cover for the nurse who has been on sick leave for a few months, but again it will be an untrained replacement who will take some time to get up to speed. In terms of doctors and management, I can only observe and usually despair at the lack of any form of rational strategic thinking.

Friends: well, let's say I need to work a bit harder on this aspect of my life. I have plenty of acquaintances but few real friends, and almost none in the region where I actually live. This has to be a priority for the coming year.

In terms of hobbies, I expect that badminton and running will continue, as soon as the knee recovers. I don't have any particular ambitions - no plans for half-marathons or even any more 10k runs. I might go back to marshalling at Run-Forest-Run next year, but we'll see how it goes. I'm still making the dress for Sister D, and because the pattern works much better with stretchy fabric I've volunteered to make yet another one for Lola II, because the one I made for her before wasn't stretchy.

My home environment is about to undergo a great deal of change, and this is another aspect I'm planning to concentrate on over the next 12 months.

On the whole I am glad that 2015 is coming to an end, and rather looking forward to a fresh start for 2016. Happy New Year!

Sun + rain = camping + walking

Sudeley Castle, August 2015

It's been a rainy Bank Holiday weekend, although to be fair, some of Saturday wasn't bad. As I write, I hear muffled clapping, cheering and shouts of encouragement or triumph from the bowling greens, where we are reaching the end of a month of National Bowling action. Our period of exclusive entry to our little trio of streets guarded by high-vis-vest-clad doormen is nearly over.

In the past couple of weeks I've had quite a few evening appointments, including appearing on a panel for a different Diabetes UK local group from the one I used to attend until I'd had enough of their rudeness. The demographic was very similar - nobody under 50, a couple of opinionated and outspoken members, polite attention and some interesting questions. The panel consisted of two podiatrists, an optometrist, me, and a retired local GP who is fairly eminent in the Diabetes professional world. People were very interested in what the podiatrists had to say and much less interested in my contribution. I expect it's because someone's always banging on at them about food, whereas they have few opportunities to raise questions about feet.

I also enjoyed a weekend away camping with Lola II. The campsite was fine, including excellent hot showers but with fields mostly on a slope. I managed to find a relatively flat bit to pitch the tent before collecting Lola II from the station. We did a bit of campsite cooking and some eating out, but I'd brought quite a lot of salad ingredients, because a) that's what I had in the fridge, b) it's supposed to be summer and c) Lola II and I are both grappling with weight management.

We visited an old prison and a castle. The prison also contained a Cotswolds information centre, and Sudeley Castle (and Gardens) was staging an event including re-enactment of the period of Richard III, including costumes, armour, archery and music. The castle was home to Henry VIII's last wife, Katherine Parr, and she is buried there too - the only Queen of England to be buried in the grounds of a private home. There are gardens as well as the castle, and exhibitions on all sorts of aspects of historical interest. We were there for hours and didn't see everything - there was plenty to keep us occupied, and it was really hot.

On Sunday we met up with Landrover Man and Bee Lady for a lovely walk in the countryside. LRM can always be relied on to plan a route and guide us around it, thus saving endless hours of getting lost which would happen if I were in charge.

The Weather Gods had a hand in the loveliness of the countryside, providing torrential rain halfway through when we were in the middle of a field, far from shelter. I had been too lazy to bother wearing proper boots so I was in trainers, and could wring my socks out at the end, but it was worth it - not cold, and good to catch up with bees, farmyard machinery, sheep and septic tanks. I can vouch for the impressive improvement to the vista chez LRM and BL because we were sent 'before' and 'after' pictures of the septic tank cover.

So that was a good weekend away. For the Bank Holiday weekend I decided I had procrastinated long enough and it was time to put in a bit of effort into choosing and buying a car. So early on Saturday I got up and did a Parkrun instead. I find that buying a car (or in fact buying anything except food and charity shop clothes) is really difficult and fairly unpleasant, but I found one in the end and it's probable that the ordeal will be over in a month or so. The dreadful experience is too fresh to write about now, but I'm sure I'll manage to bring further vehicular news at some point.

Sudeley Castle again

Not at work

Groombridge Place, June 2013

See what happens when I don't have to go to work and I'm not away from home? Blogs happen, that's what. And I am told that Lola II is working towards her contribution to the Wedding Presence camping trip blog post (I think Mr M has done his, although he hasn't sent it through yet). So we are backing up a little now to report news from a week ago...

At work, I agreed to cover the ante-natal clinic, which takes place in the other Trust hospital - we don't have any maternity services where I usually work. As regular readers may remember, I am not a fan of ante-natal clinics, and this was no exception. There are too many patients and not enough time, and I felt rather exploited although the consultant and the nurse took care to thank me very appreciatively. Next time I will be more 'assertive' about time-keeping.

Back at my usual hospital I observed a patient being started with an insulin pump, which took quite a long time but wasn't very complicated really. I think that the hard work starts afterwards, to try and fine tune the background delivery of insulin to match the patient's needs from hour to hour. Being away from work this week I'm missing that part of the job, but I'll try and catch up with a different patient some time, to see the follow up.

And then there were a few things not related to work. It was a red letter day on Thursday: the first time I managed to run 5 km in under 30 minutes (all on flat tarmac). My timed runs on Saturday mornings with Parkrun are getting faster too, but despite planning to go out this week, I haven't felt up to it yet, partly because of the trip at the weekend, to see Landrover Man (LRM) and Bee Lady (BL).

This was actually me gatecrashing one of Mr M and Lola II's wedding presence, and it was lovely as usual. BL provided an extensive food preference questionnaire which also included attitudinal questions to see if she should be sticking with conventional choices or going a bit experimental. After a tour of the LRM/BL mansion and grounds, then the enormous and delicious dinner followed by games on Saturday night, we were looking forward to the usual standard of walking on Sunday. We only got a bit lost once and had to do a bit of off-piste mountaineering (Lola II was very brave and I got stung by nettles) but it was excellent, if exhausting. I had to have a sleep on the motorway on the way home, and was very glad not to be going to work on Monday. I think I felt the effects of the indulgence followed by the exertion for a few more days, but it may be the unaccustomed freedom of not being at work.

[Bee Facts: there were many, mostly about how to manage your hives - BL doesn't like killing a perfectly good queen just in order to limit the number. So she has ended up with ten hives, which is A Lot. LRM was very patient and listened to many, many Bee Facts without much complaint. Unfortunately it isn't quite so interesting to hear about his energy management spreadsheets.]

So this week I have welcomed my tradesmen about whom I have already written, and the latest carpenter says the job isn't big enough and has suggested another carpenter. I have donated blood without incident, and even managed to visit the charity shops for long enough to acquire the clothes that I was after. Yesterday I made an enormous effort and cleared out about two thirds of the clutter that was getting in my way, and then it was time for badminton. Today I had lunch with an old friend, and I am looking forward to the weekend, which holds the annual Food & Drink Festival.

Mostly walking and a bit of running

Canterbury pub

As usual, quite a lot going on, but little inclination to document everything. I remember when I used to write a lot about social stuff and holidays, but for some reason I'm not doing this so much. I suppose I feel a little exposed because anybody at all can read this blog, and while my family and friends may like to know more personal stuff, those who are more interested in the professional stuff may be put off. I need to spend some time thinking about who my target audience is, and who I'd like it to be, and how comfortable people I know might be if I feature them here. But I don't think I use anyone's real name any more, so perhaps it doesn't matter.

Last week, on the spur of the moment, Mr A and I contacted our old friends Landrover Man and Bee Lady, whom we see approximately once a year (if you go by the number of mentions they get on this blog). It was a beautiful day and we had a nice long walk and a lovely pub lunch and it was brilliant. We're going to try and get them over here a bit sooner than in a year's time, but it may still be a month or two away. We're working on it.

My 'Couch to 5k' plan is still going quite well, and I'm on target to be able to run 5 kilometres by the end of May, all being well. It's an interesting programme, with just 60 seconds running at a time at the beginning, and I've now managed to run very slowly for 20 minutes in one go without ill effect. I'm starting to see how I will be able to run 5 km by the end of the series, which I always believed but didn't quite comprehend how it might be achieved.

On the other hand, badminton is going through a difficult period, with my Club C in abeyance due to hall refurbishment, and lots of end-of-season administration with Club A because I am Secretary. Club C doesn't play over the summer, but Club B (where I used to play a year ago) does - but I took a break from Club B because of a few annoying members. I shall be going back to Club B over the summer to see if I can put up with said annoying members, and then decide which of them to join for next season along with Club A. It's complicated.

Mr A and I have just returned from a few days camping in Kent. We went on Saturday, arriving quite late, and then it rained all day Sunday so we went for as much indoor activity as possible, starting in Rochester with their local museum. The highlight for Mr A was a camera mounted on top of the building which you could control from inside - eventually he had to relinquish control to a visiting child. Because it was still raining we spent the afternoon watching a film, then it was still raining and getting dark and we couldn't read any more in the tent and it was getting cold too, so obviously we went to a pub to get warm, which happened to have friendly locals and live music.

On Monday the sun came out, so we went to Whitstable for our traditional Guinness, oysters and crab sandwiches on the beach. We walked along the beach all the way to Seasalter, then went back to the campsite to take advantage of the better weather in order to sit and read. Unfortunately, it started to rain again on Monday night, and didn't stop all night. For some reason Mr A woke up very early this morning and decided to make tea without looking at the time. When he told me my tea was ready I asked him if he realised it was only 6.40 a.m? We packed everything up in the rain, loaded it into the car in the rain and drove back in the rain - there's going to be a fair bit of drying out needed when it's a bit less damp outside.

New Year holiday

A subset of the full group, at the top of a hill

I've been away - a whole week in Northumberland, with friends, most of whom I have known for nearly thirty years. Walking, eating, playing games, no phone signal, no Interwebnets, and the weather was kind as well. And as I don't have exams in January, this was the first New Year holiday for such a long time when I didn't have to do any revision, and could go walking whenever I liked.

As a group, we have clearly aged, and some of us have mellowed to the point that we hardly did any walking after lunch, and not all that much before lunch either. Just the highlights, then:

• Wonderful walks (with new gaiters)
• Having time to read three whole books in a week
• Playing duets with Lola II
• Meeting up with another old college friend
• Photo-charades (taking a still image to represent a film)
• Photo montage of the last 25 years of these New Year holidays
• Feuerzangenbowle
• Splendid food and drink
• A lecture on the LHC and its uses (courtesy of CERNoise)
• The Indian cafe on the way home.

Looking back on 2012, it has been quite a good year. I finally started working as a Dietitian, and I love the people I work with, even if the job hasn't been ideal. A few highlights of the last year include:

• Starting a job, which happily turned out to be full-time, although in a hospital rather than the community as I had hoped
• Becoming a Friend of the Falconry Centre - should I renew for the next year?
• My solitary holiday, which I am very tempted to repeat this year
• Two days in the respiration chamber (this experience supplied my favourite blog post of the year).
• The family river cruise
• Getting another job, this time in my preferred speciality area of diabetes.

I'm hoping that this year will be as good as the last.

An excess of walking

Ducks in Norfolk, July 2011

The annual Leamington Peace Festival was held at the weekend, but unlike the last couple of years, it poured with rain, albeit intermittently. I walked through the site on my way back from buying hoover bags in town because there's usually something interesting to see. This year I was in no way tempted to hang about, except that the band that was on at the time sounded pretty good. The stalls were exactly the same as ever, including the usual reiki nutters waving their hands about, and the punters sitting in front of them with their eyes closed imagining goodness knows what.

But I walked on without even taking a photo because it was raining very hard, and the site (in fact, the whole town) was swarming with young people forming large groups and getting in the way, squealing at each other, and wearing wholly unsuitable clothing that in no way protected them from the rain. Nobody at all was wearing a coat, and most had no more than a very damp T shirt. Young people, I don't know. When I was their age, we never did anything stupid, like gathering on the local golf course and lighting bonfires. I'm sure that if we did, we would have worn coats and sensible waterproof shoes. Definitely.

On Sunday, in contrast, I did a kind of sponsored walk backed by the local radio station, in aid of the hospital baby care unit. Although it was a sponsored walk I didn't really get round to doing anything about raising any money, I just gave them a contribution. Asking people to give you money for walking is quite tiresome, and I don't like being asked for such favours (although I often oblige), so I didn't bother.

I was suckered into the walk by colleagues at work who had signed up. In the end the one who had put the most pressure on me dropped out, but I carried on regardless. It was twelve miles from Warwick to Coventry, and three of us started out at around 10 o'clock. One of my colleagues is a 'power walker' who regularly goes out on ten-mile walks FOR FUN, so she hung around for about a mile before zooming off into the distance. My other colleague stuck with me, but still set a blistering pace - I kept up with her, even at the end when I started to wonder why I had agreed to such a stupid idea in the first place. We finished in about three and a half hours, which is a pretty good time, especially for an old-timer like me.

I am suffering now though, with my feet a little tender and hips aching quite a lot. Walking twelve miles at that speed certainly feels like an achievement, but it was not fun, and I am perfectly happy with using badminton as a leisure activity without spending hours at the weekend walking so fast for so long that it hurts afterwards. So I shall be keeping the 'medal' that was awarded, if only to remind myself never to do it again. Meanwhile, the colleague who set the pace for me is working towards a marathon in October. She's welcome to it.

Birthday walk

Cubbington, Feb 2012

Lola II came to visit for her birthday, with Mr M. Lola II loves surprises, Mr M loves Lola II, so surprises are called for. Of course, I love Lola II as well, but I am too lazy/busy/preoccupied with my own troubles (delete as you think fit) to bother with surprises very much, in addition to the fact that I can't keep a secret to save my life, and Mr A isn't much better.

Surprises planned by Mr M:

• Getting Skype installed on a computer at mum and dad's house in advance so they could Skype Lola II on her birthday
• Creating masks with the face of Lola II for mum and dad to wear for the Skype call
• Producing more Lola II masks to be utilised at any appropriate time
• Arranging for our American/Israeli cousin to Skype Lola II
• Producing calorie-free green peas, which consisted of the letter P cut out of green cardboard
• Getting the music and playing the piano part of an Adele song so Lola II could sing along
• A tiny birthday cake
• About six or seven birthday presents.

Surprises planned by me:

• A walk in the countryside and a pub lunch with seven other people
• A packet of Durian crisps.

I think this indicates clearly the amount of effort each of us is prepared to put into the task of creating surprises for someone with a birthday. I did manage to assist with the green P's, scheduling the Skype call from our cousin, and practising the song.

Things started to fall apart when Mr M couldn't get Skype installed successfully for mum and dad, but sister D and family were going to be visiting on Sunday and might be able to complete the installation. Then the Skype call from our cousin didn't turn up on schedule at 6 p.m. our time, but my mobile rang at midnight (Lola II had sensibly turned hers off), waking me up enough to answer but not enough to hold any sort of meaningful conversation. Our cousin had thought we would be awake and celebrating - he obviously knows us less well than we thought. And as we drove off to the start of the walk, Mr A let the cat out of the bag by asking "Have your parents Skyped you yet?"

Millennium Way walk, Feb 2012

The walk and pub lunch were wonderful, the weather was perfect, and Landrover Man navigated with distinction. I learned a new Bee Fact: you can transport bees in their hives inside a car, but it's a good idea to wear protective gear while you're driving just in case they get out.