Author Archives: stylepointofview

Three and a half hours is a long time

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Yesterday I set off to take my son to lesson, a three and a half hours lesson. The place isn’t that far, about half an hour, only, that is one hour drive if I stay, two if I don’t.

Therefore, I had decided I would stay. But what to do in such a long time?!

I leave the house “well equipped”:

  • walking gear, I intend to go for a one hour walk. Can’t do more unfortunately as my sciatica will not let me (:
  • kindle
  • crossword puzzles ( I have recently rediscovered them!)
  • 3 previously downloaded episodes of a new Netflix series (generously suggested by said son, who taught me how to do the download on my phone. Although not certain I can put up with watching them on something THAT LITTLE!!)
  • Supermarket shopping list and bags

In the car I even have a duvet…it has been there for the last month, longing to be taken to the laundrette! You never know, if I fall asleep it might come handy!! Anyway, I am set to last three and a half hours in that land.

Along the road to get there I feel nauseous…it gets worse and worse… I leave my son and go the bar to get a coke (he says that might sort me out). My schedule is already threatened!!

I sit there dressed as a pro, walking gear, sunglasses….. sipping a coke and smoking! Well, the coke is therapeutic….

Half way through sipping my coke I decide to start walking….a little stop back to the car to make sure for another ten minutes that I am not sick along the road and then , away we go! About 20 minutes into my walk the sky starts looking menacing…mmmm….another five minutes and the first drops start…

I decide to enter a second bar. Well, I had forgotten to bring a bottle of water I suppose..but I need the toilet too and perhaps the water isn’t enough of an excuse to do that and sit down while I wait for the rain to stop. So I also buy a little sandwich, just after having had lots of trouble digesting lunch…

I am setting off again. it has stopped raining. Well, it had…five minutes later I stop at the third bar!!!!! Thank god there’s plenty of those around there!

I am running out of cash by now, so I order a coffee, knowing full well I will not be able to sleep tonight! And I wait some more. By this time I have been out for one and a half hours…I am risking to get behind schedule.

The sun comes out, yes! I leave, no more bars beyond this area, I have about twenty minutes to walk. It’s sunny …and it’s raining…again, ahhhhhhhh!!!!!

I make it across to the little park a few minutes away without actually getting too wet,  at least I have a cap. Now I am waiting under a tree. The thing is, if it keeps on raining, I will get drenched, I cannot do the wet t-shirt look at my age!!!!

I finally walk the last leg of my lengthy journey without further bursts of rain and make to the car. By now I have used two and a half of my hours, I’d better hurry and do the shopping, no time to waste:))))

E.

(this actually happened back in spring time but, after writing it, I forgot to publish it!!)

Healthy eating

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You know how it is when you are a mother and you want your sons to eat well and anyway you are getting old and conscious you should be eating better? Well, I am always trying really hard to cook the right things!! Tonight, I had decided we should avoid meat. Not an easy task here, I tell you! We are certainly a long way from being vegetarian and, I am really not very good at cooking without a little meat. But, eggs I can usually do. I do get bored though, so I am forever trying new things, sometimes (ok often!), with no recipe to follow. In fact, I make them up, not always successfully. My sons have given a name to my creations, they call them “Mummy’s ideas” and when they see something they don’t recognise arriving at the table, they ask, with a mixture of fright and scorn, if it’s one of those!

As I was saying, tonight it was going to be eggs. So, when I was at the super market I bought asparagus (they look pretty, such a lovely shade of green!!), then two tomatoes (quiche always looks nice with slices on top) and cheese. Next thing you know I am putting thin slices of potatoes in the bottom of the oven dish, yes, because at the last minute I decided I was going to cook in the oven instead of in a saucepan, and add another ingredient. That’s something else I do quite often, I change my plan as I go along…anyway, I positioned all ingredients and put it in the oven. Well, tonight’s dinner did look very pretty, only it didn’t taste as well! There goes my attempt to make something vegetarian…We all agreed a little “pancetta” would have been perfect in it!!

Never mind, my younger son said he is going to eat the leftovers tomorrow, covered in cheese, to improve the flavour, or rather, to cover it!

E.

 

Stains

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I am a messy person when I eat. Probably because I can’t do it slowly, too much the enthusiasm for food to be able to do it any other way.

Worse when I have to wait for it. Yesterday morning, I had to go for a blood test and I had to be on an empty stomach! By the time I made it to the bar, I was starving and in desperate need for a coffee. So I did my usual, I devoured a doughnut and gulped down a huge coffee. I was wearing a white shirt. One of my favourite white shirts.

I realised soon after I had stained it, therefore, as soon as I got home, I put it in the washing machine to make sure I got the stain out. I then put it out to dry. All is well that ends well.

No, it didn’t though. When I pick it up, to my horror, I realised that yes, the coffee stain had come out, but, there were some blood stains I hadn’t seen on the sleeve and of course, those, had been nicely fixed on the cotton by my warm wash!!!!!! AHHHHHHH!

That’s when I started my quest for the elimination at all costs of those terrible stains. Wash in w/m with stain remover powder. Still there. Wash in w/m with bleach. Still there. Overnight sleeve in pure bleach. Not there anymore!! Smelt of beach though, so I put it in w/m again, long wash.

Merrely, I went to get my beautiful shirt out and check again  it was back to all white….

The stain has indeed come out…so has the sleeve though! As in, it has disintegrated….AHHHHH! Perhaps a little too much bleach?!

E.