After the excitement of last week, a relatively straight-forward one and therefore there is little news to relate this week apart from the appearance on page 4 of a national newspaper of someone exceedingly important in the local community. Continue reading →

Rushing to get to the movies, my husband and I told the kids we had to leave “right now” at which point our teenage daughter headed for the bathroom to apply makeup. Her dad yelled for her to get in the car immediately, and headed for the garage grumbling.

On the way to the multiplex my husband glanced in the rear-view mirror and caught our teen applying lipstick and blush, which produced the predictable lecture. “Look at your mom,” he said. “She didn’t put on any makeup just to go sit in a dark movie theatre.”

From the back I heard, “Yeah, but Mom doesn’t need makeup.”

My heart swelling with the compliment, I turned back to thank this sweet, wonderful daughter of mine just as she continued, “Nobody looks at her.” Continue reading →

It’s been a good week. We had not one but two date nights, Penny had two bridge sessions, we got to borrow Bertie, the spaniel from down the road, for a day and had a lovely walk around the Edgecote estate. And, after four years of thinking about it, we finally got a new carpet laid in the lounge. I need a sit down after so much excitement. Continue reading →

And a Happy New Year to you all! We celebrated the arrival of the new decade in our usual fashion – by snoring contentedly through midnight and much of the following morning. We can always hope that the New Year brings some positive change but I’m not holding my breath. Continue reading →

We hope you all enjoyed a marvellously marvellous Christmas – we did! And, we had a fun-filled, action-packed week beforehand with the unveiling of Penelope’s new kitchen, an outing to Stratford to see a terrific play and someone celebrated a birthday. What could be better?

And, it didn’t rain on Christmas Day (just every other day before and since). Continue reading →

Sorry for the tardy arrival of this week’s Picayune – we’ve been busy and someone has a birthday as well! Oops.

We’ve spent the last few days painting, decorating, cleaning, and moving furniture to enable us to have the Grand Reveal of the new kitchen. The builders finished on Thursday (just for the holiday break – they’ll be back again in the New Year, don’t worry).  Thankfully, though, we just about completed all our tasks in time for the arrival of some special guests who made all the right noises and said all the right things so I guess it’s all been worth it? Continue reading →

So, it’s definitely true. Turkeys do vote for Christmas. The electorate in the UK have decided that a pathological liar, a misogynistic racist narcissist is the best choice to lead this country into irrelevancy. What could possibly go wrong? A thoroughly sad and depressing result. Continue reading →

Not one, not two, nor even three. On Wednesday we had ten builders on site – I guess my rant at the end of last week had an impact. Count ‘em – ten! Four electricians, a plumber, two plasterers, two labourers and our usual very patient carpenter. And, it’s remarkable how the presence of other trades folks encourages the patient carpenter to get a bit of a move-on. Continue reading →

What a miserable, miserable week. Depressingly dismal, dreary and drizzly. And miserable. It’s been cloudy and wet all week and then on Friday, when the sun does put in an appearance and the skies turn bright and blue, the temperature plummets through the floor. Oh my goodness, only four or five more months of this! Continue reading →

A good week. A couple of nice, sunny (if a bit chilly) days, a couple of outings, visitors visiting for a visit – what’s not to like? Continue reading →