Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Just an ordinary day

This is what I entered into the 'One Day in History' mass blog event:-

I’m up by 7.30a.m. As I draw the bedroom curtains I can’t see down to the bottom of the street for the damp & dismal fog. My first task is to rush downstairs to feed the cats and open up the cat flap. Breakfast is eaten whilst listening to and half watching the BBC news programme, then I rush around the house tidying up, washing breakfast pots and getting ready to go out. I set out about 9.30a.m.to walk down to the Post Office. I always try and walk rather than catching the bus as it is my way of getting exercise. I have to post a letter to my friend in Lincolnshire and to buy some more stamps. Most of my friends have the internet and we communicate by e-mail, except for birthdays and Christmas when traditional cards are sent through the post. The fog has lifted a little but as I walk through the recreation ground I pass a man walking his dog; he smiles ruefully at me and declares ‘Rum weather’. I nod my head and smile in agreement. The topic of conversation in the queue at the post office counter is, of course, the weather. Why are we never happy unless we are complaining about the weather? Still, it gets us all talking to each other, I suppose.

Next stop is my local supermarket for a little food shopping. I have to use the cash machine first and of course, there is another queue, no talk of the weather here though, just anxious hurried faces willing people to press the buttons a bit more quickly than they are doing. I finally get my money, after the machine has asked me various questions about my requirements. No I don’t need to ‘top-up’ my mobile phone today, thank you. I grab a trolley and set off towards the aisles where I know I can quickly pick up what I want, but no, I can’t, I have to go off on a hunt for lettuce and tomatoes because they have been moved – again. I never did find the coleslaw.

Back home I put away my shopping, drink coffee, read the newspaper headlines and then pop next door to see if my neighbours are ok – they recently had to have one of their cats put to sleep and are still upset about it. This afternoon I have various tasks to do on the computer. I’m in the middle of proof reading a booklet I’m doing for a friend but I’m distracted by an e-mail from a distant relative I have been in touch with over our family history - we share great grandparents. He found me through my web site and we have done quite a lot of detective work to find out where our great grandmother was buried, a story of accidents, widowhood, re-marriage and family disapproval has emerged. It’s too long and personal a story for here but it’s so good to have solved a mystery. Anyway, he has sent me a couple of photographs of the house our ancestors lived in, so, of course I have to thank him and download them and then print them. I think the word I’m searching for is procrastination.

The worker will soon return from his teaching job in a college so I start to think about an evening meal. Oatcakes filled with cheese, tomatoes and mushrooms with a side salad and mango chopped into mango yoghurt, not very interesting but the best I can do for now. I also manage to bake an apricot madeira cake, ready for tomorrow. Cats are fed again and then we eat and chat, watch the news and generally mull over the days events before the washing up is done, the curtains are drawn against the darkening sky and he disappears upstairs to the study with marking and lesson planning and I sit with the cats watching the television before deciding I'd much rather read and listen to some music.

2 comments:

  1. Haven't seen either yours or mine on the site yet. Read David Cameron's entry and also quite a few interesting ones.

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  2. carol, didn't see that one. I did read Stephen Fry's entry and a super one from a girl who lived on a narrow boat on a canal and worked for the National Trust.

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