Gilbert White

Since starting his studying for the priesthood, my husband and I have had very little quality time together. So we decided that once a week on our day off, we would go out for the day and do something different from the normal everyday stuff.
Today is the first of these days, we also decided that one or other of us would choose where we were going as a surprise to the other. My husband chose today's place which turned out to be Gilbert Whites house in Selbourne, Hampshire.
It took a while to get to it and from the outside it looked like any of the other houses along the road! Once inside however you could see how much land there was at the back!
We wandered around the rooms looking at the displays, upstairs is also a large room dedicated to Captain Lawrence Oates, the Antarctic explorer who famously said "I am going outside, I may be some time" as he walked to his death in a vain attempt to save his fellow explorers.
Gilbert White was a priest and naturalist who was the first person to record in detail much of the natural history of the English countryside. Once we had walked around the inside of his house we had a cream tea in the tearoom before heading out into his gardens, which were amazing! we spent a long time walking around the acres of gardens and wild areas, and saw lots of birds and insects. As we were almost back at the house we found a labyrinth, well of course we had to walk it. My husband told me about them as I literally walked in his footsteps around it.
We had a really relaxed day together and both enjoyed it, roll on next weeks day together!

Sports and Welfare

This morning I got Flower up for school as usual, we always have her over on a Monday night, and then once she had been picked up I went quickly to get some shopping before going to her school to watch the sports day. It was very warm and all the children had a sports bottle full of water with them. Flower was in the Yellow team so I together with her mum Sam, had put yellow tee shirts on i support. Go Yellows!! There were loads of races for all the year groups, Flower did her first race which was the obstacle race, Sam and I went to the finish line so that we could get photos, she did really well and came second. Then came her second race which was the "egg and spoon" race, well what can I say!!..... she pretty much ran with it, she didn't drop it once and as she crossed the finish line the others were still only half way down the track! One of the mums said "she's glued it to the spoon, but just as she said it Flower tripped on her way over to see us and I caught the egg just before it hit the ground! It wasn't a real one though. When all the races had been done the children came over to their supporters and had their lunch, lots like us had brought a picnic, which we sat on the sports field to eat. What a lovely time we had. My husband had asked one of his parishioners if he could visit, as she had not long come out of hospital, (she together with her husband are very dear friends of ours), so when she told him she would love to see him she also asked if he would bring me and Litlun and have dinner with them. It was a lovely late afternoon and evening, we all chatted then later we sat down to eat. MrsY we had a fab meal, and wonderful company thank you so much.

Bath time

For some time now, whenever I have applied the fly repellent to Mouse the sponge has got dirtier and dirtier, she really needs a bath, so today I decided to give her one. I did wonder who was going to get the wettest! I decided to fill her large water bucket with water before mucking out the paddock that way it would have a chance to warm up a little, as it is yet another hot day, much hotter than yesterday. I brought her in and tipped jugs of water over her mane and tail then added shampoo, then did the same for the rest of her body, after ten minutes of trying to rinse the shampoo out of her mane I decided there was nothing for it but to use the hose! Now Mouse is 3 years old and hasn't had a bath in the 2 years and 3 months that I have had her, I don't know about before that. So this was going to be quite interesting... or so I thought, I began doing her legs as she has had them hosed to get the mud off in the winter, she was fine so I went up to her shoulder, across her back over her rump down her tail, round her udders then back along her back up her mane..... in fact the only time she showed any emotion was when I accidentally stuck the hose up her nose! she turned round and sniffed the jet of water!! then her ears showed surprise (it was rather funny) she even tried to drink from the hose! After using a sweat scrape to remove the excess water I put her back out in the field, no rug or anything as it really was hot enough to dry her off. She didn't roll either! as for me, I just got wet arms and feet, quite amazing really as I thought I would be in for a battle.

Rare Breeds Show.

Today we went to the rare breeds show, Mum came over with her dog,then the two of them together with Flower, Litlun, me and my dog (my husband and Beth were working,) set off to the show.
We had, as usual got a picnic with us which we left in the cooler box in the car.
We wandered around looking at all the cows, sheep and pigs, my dog was quite unfazed by any of the animals including a huge pig which tried to taste her foot, where as Mums dog was quite scared, we had to walk round the animal free stalls for a while she got so upset, she doesn't like goats!
It was lovely and warm but not so hot that we needed to worry about burning, at 1 pm we went back to the car to have our lunch, putting the dogs in the crate with the boot open and plenty of water, they were happy to look out of the back window for most of the time.
Usually I prepare the picnic but this time Mum said she would do it, there was a huge salad, ham, chicken cold sausages in bacon, eggs salmon bread rolls, crisps, olives and feta. After which we had dessert which was Apple pie and custard. Yummy.
When we had all eaten as much as we wanted, we went back into the show, we wandered around the rest of the stalls, went and saw the rabbits, chickens and ducks, then some alpacas, then Litlun found a stall with ferrets on it, having had several ferrets I couldn't help having a cuddle with a lovely albino Jill ferret, even Flower held it, they were so docile, lovely animals.
We sat down and had ice creams mid afternoon, before heading back home for a cuppa, then Mum and her dog went home whilst I prepared the dinner.

What happened to the old me?

I thought I would have a little look through my old blogs, starting from the beginning, just randomly and read a few. I am beginning to wish I hadn't now.
What on earth has happened to me? The blog used to be funny in parts with the odd joke or funny blog but now its drab and flat. May be my outlook on life has changed, as my husband has just suggested. I suppose in the last year and a half I have seen and had a few life changing experiences...
Maybe I should have more fun maybe I should change my job for something more fun, there is no fun in our job any more management have ensured that it is totally impossible, yet I read a newspaper report last week that stated work force performance was almost doubled if the workers were happy. I know that we now do all our obs and paperwork at the scene now as opposed to on the vehicles en route to hospital, just to give us time to think.
Yes I think its time for a change, but as I am no good at anything other than monkey skills I have no idea what I could do!

In need of sleep!

I got home from work at around 8am and couldn't believe how tired I was! Although we didn't have a great number of jobs we had quite a few cover moves, so I still had to be awake!
I decided to go to bed for a couple of hours before taking the dog to the swimming pool, that was a mistake! I was woken by my husband at ten past eleven, I was supposed to be at the pool at eleven thirty! Ahh well, we got there at 11:35 (speeding officer, me?? Never) Where I met my Mum and her dog and a man with another collie, the three have all swum together before and got down to the serious business of chasing tennis balls which we threw in for them.
Having got them out half an hour later and dried them off I returned home for some lunch. Storm rang to see if I would like to take the dog for a walk with her two today, we often walk the three dogs together. I collected them and drove to one of our usual walking places, it was quite cool today, although I may have felt it more being so tired. There are two paths we can choose from in this area, and today we took the shorter of the two.
Back home having done the dinner and sent my husband on his way to work, I settled down to a nice read before I went to sleep.... I'm not sure I reached the end of the page.

Naughty.....

The above post appeared on our notice board at work. A little rude but rather amusing......and probably true!

Hot dogs

This morning my husband got up and went to church in time for the 8:00am service leaving me to sleep on, when he got back he woke me up with a cup of tea, ahhh.
Then we both went to the 10:00am service where I sat with Flower and Sam, whilst my husband got dressed up in all the vestments for the service.
Afterwards we had a glass of wine and some birthday cake as one of our friends was celebrating her 90th birthday.
Back home I prepared everything for dinner, as my mum and her dog are coming over for the rest of the day.
After a cup of tea we set off with the dogs for a walk in the woods, its not easy walking then in this heat as they are both dashing around all over the place getting hot and then find it difficult to cool down, at least its cooler in the woods! We stopped off to do Mouse on the way home then sat and chatted whilst the dinner cooked.
Yet another chilled out calm day, I am starting to enjoy this . . . unfortunately I am back to work again tomorrow, that will be anything but chilled and calm I'll put money on that!!

Wedding. Round one!

Today my husband and I both have the day off, we decided to go down to our local market and get some veg and have a wander, its been months since we have been to the market.
We walked down, it was boiling hot again! once there we were surprised by how few stalls there were! one of the vendors told us it was because the pitch price has gone up so much its stopped people coming!
We got our veg and a few other bits then wandered home again, stopping en route for some cheese straws and scones from the bakery.
After lunch I went down to do Mouse accompanied by Litlun and her friend Jo.
Back home we got ready for the wedding then drove, My husband is working tomorrow so he said he would drive and not drink (yippee)
The bride and groom looked fabulous, the bride was wearing a long sheer white dress with a train and tiara, she said it took two hours to do her hair too! The groom was in his family tartan and looked very smart, I usually see him in white!!! (a ghi, he belongs to the same Aikido club as me). There was a hog roast and loads of salads in the evening.
It was a lovely day, and we wish the Bride and Groom all our very best wishes.

Hot Hot Hot

Today the temperature is supposed to reach 30 degrees. Nice for my dog and my mums dog as we took them to the canine swimming pool again, so they were able to cool off a bit. They were swimming with a third collie this week and all seemed to get on well, each (as is the norm for collies) chasing after a tennis ball. Although it was cool for them in the pool it was very muggy for us!
Once back home my husband and I went into town to pick up a copy of the church times as my husband is appearing in it this week.
Almost as soon as I came home Storm rang to see if I would like to take the dog out for a walk with her two dogs. I would usually keep mine in until she had dried off completely but today it was so hot that I thought it would be fine, she drove round and picked us up then drove out to a wooded area we often take them walking. We walked through the woods chatting then as we came back out again the heat hit us! I hadn't realised just how much cooler it was in the woods seeing as we still felt quite hot but back in the full sun again was almost unbearable.
Once back home I had to prepare an early dinner for my husband as he has to go into work for his second night shift.
Litlun and I went down to do Mouses fly spray and muck out the paddock, and even at half past six it was really too hot to be doing it!
Apparently it was hotter in the UK today than in Spain! I don't doubt that for one minute.

1 of 2

This set of shifts (tour) is one of two tours before my proper annual leave, I have just had a weeks annual leave, which I had swapped with one of my work mates so that I could be at my husbands ordination and all that went with it! so it seems strange knowing I only have two tours before having my proper summer leave.
The first day and first night were not too bad, we did little cover moves and most of the jobs were genuine and fairly straight forward. The second day and second night were completely different though and I am sure some of the many unnecessary cover moves that we did were down to the staff who work in the dispatch centre, but the jobs!! any one who knows me will know that after a certain job about 15 months ago, I hate jobs involving babies (paediatrics) and both the day and night we got one, the day job was almost a carbon copy of the bad job except we managed to get this child into hospital in a stable state. I have not and will not find out the outcome of this job, I choose not to know. the other was an over anxious mother but all the way to the job we were wondering what we would be met with!
Still one tour down one to go.
On Monday morning my travel tickets arrived for my coach trip to see my friend up north, (8th August straight after a night shift) I can't believe how cheap the coach fare is and I don't have to do any driving after my night shift!
Ahh well five days off now.

Festival of Speed 2010

This year I did a shift with a private ambulance service at the festival of speed, we had to be on site for 7am we were given radios and maps and a briefing of how the management wanted the ambulance service to deal with the patients it received. We were also given a meal bag and as much water as we needed.
It was really hot and sunny which made the day a really enjoyable shift, even if it did run over by an hour due to a car dumping oil on the track!
I was put with a girl I hadn't met before which didn't matter as she was really nice and we spent most of the day chatting, there were quite a few patients to see but only one or two had to be shipped off to hospital.
The Red Arrows did an air display as did a couple of helicopters. There were loads of bikes and cars as usual and plenty of celebrities, one of which was Dougie Lampkin who I saw two weeks ago at the Moto GP at Silverstone. He rode over to our ambulance and chatted to us for a while, he is as I said before my favorite biker of any discipline, I think what he can do with his bike is wicked!
My daughter Beth also had a job there and as she was going to it she ended up following Dougie up the track crossing, she got a short film clip and a couple of photos, one of which I have posted here.
All in all it was a good day, I just wish it had been the Saturday then I would have been able to spend a little more time with Litlun, who's birthday it was on Friday. Happy Birthday Litlun.

Swimming

Today my mum and I took our dogs to the canine swimming pool. Mums dog has only been once before and really hated it, she couldn't wait to get out! Where as , on the other hand my dog loves it and can't wait to get in! Once there we showered off the dogs just to make sure they were not too grubby before they went in, then the lady who owns it put mums dog on a lead to ensure she did go in, she guided her round the pool for a couple of laps whilst my dog just kept going in after the tennis ball and bringing it back for me to throw in again. Suddenly mums dog saw the ball and made a bee line for it, that was the turning point, we found another ball and threw one for each of the dogs, ten minutes later mums dog was off the lead having as much fun as my dog.

A&E

After all the excitement of the last few days my husband went back to work Monday to his fire service job.
Over the weekend it was extremely hot, he had to wear quite a few layers of heavy clothing and hadn't had enough to drink, back at work he had two prolonged bouts of hard physical work wearing full fire fighting kit in the extremely high temperatures we are having at the moment, and again he hadn't had enough to drink!
During the night he woke me up feeling extremely unwell, muscle cramps, joint aches head ache and several other symptoms. I rang the out of hours doctors but changed my mind half way through the conversation and decided to take him up to the casualty department of the hospital.
Once there he saw a triage nurse who took him through to the majors area of the A&E unit, where he was seen by a doctor. We were there for about 5 hours in total, but came away with some antibiotics as he has managed to get a kidney infection probably from not drinking enough fluids in this heat!
My poor husband is not feeling at all well.

Bouquet, Birettas and Banoffee pie

Yesterday morning I got up at the same time as my husband as he was going to be participating in his first service at 0800 am, followed by another service at 1000am where he and the other new curate Rachel would be introduced formally to the congregation. Between the two services we came home had some breakfast and collected Beth and Litlun, My husband's friends had come down to watch the service which was nice for him too. During the service the two new curates were presented with cards and the keys to the church and Myself and Rachel's partner were also given a gift, I was given a huge bouquet of beautiful flowers whilst he was given a bottle of wine. Then afterwards it was into the church centre for cake and wine (or squash in my case as I was driving).
Back at home my husband put the new cards up and I put the flowers into THREE vases, the vases were all big too, the bouquet was so huge. We had a cup of tea and a snack then it was back to the priests house for a hog roast (!!!) to welcome my husband and Rachel to the parish. There were about 100 people there and live music. The food (can't comment on the hog, being as I am a veggie) was fab! there were all sorts of different types of salads, and couscous and bread it was lovely, there was wine beer and soft drinks, then came desserts..... what can I say, there was a huge creamy mousse with strawberries, meringues, brownies cakes of all types, key lime pie, but best of all (in my opinion) banoffee pie, it was delicious. (we took the car and were going to walk home).
Near to the end of the evening Rachel and my husband, Fr Ted, were presented with Birettas, oh the joy!!! oops sorry I'm sure they are lovely I just can't take them seriously, which there was some amusement over, especially as Rachel had never worn one before.
It was a lovely evening, both the new curates mingled with all the guests, I sat with Litlun, Sam, Flower, my son CJ and his girlfriend amber.

Ordination

Today when I woke up, I had breakfast and did all the animals just as normal, but that's as normal as it got, after that it was showers and hair washes, Beth doing my hair and hers then getting dressed up and my mum coming round. Then we set off for the cathedral in which my husband was to be ordained Deacon, together with 22 other people.
We were very early but I didn't care I wanted to get as good a view as I possibly could, and the second row from the front, I think, was a good seat. I was sat with the girls and my mum, the boys, Sam and flower, and my husbands father and his partner were there together with lots of our family and friends, including a Priest friend of ours and a couple of my husbands work mates.
The service was quite long, about 2 hours, and it was very hot inside the cathedral but it was great, I don't think I can explain how amazing it was and the atmosphere, Just amazing. When the service finished the Bishop led the newly ordained Deacons out of the cathedral to get their licences and Bibles.
Everyone then began to leave the church to find the person they had come to support, it took ages for us to find him but when we did I have to admit I cried!
Once all the family had found us there were some surprises too, people who we didn't expect to see had turned up to wish my husband well, and give him cards and gifts, it was a really special day.
After about 45 minutes we decided to go and get something to eat, as by now it was almost half past seven, a local pub did the trick, then we set off home where my husband opened his cards and presents whilst we had a large glass of wine each.

Slowing down

Today things started going at a slower pace which is rather nice to be honest. I went shopping this morning, tidied up a bit, watered the tomato's and runner beans, then Sam came over and had a cup of coffee with me before the two of us and Beth went out for lunch. We decided to go to the cathedral that my husband is being ordained at, as they have a lovely restaurant, and I thought I might catch a glimpse of him. (I didn't) We had a lovely lunch though, Beth and Sam both had jacket potatoes whilst I had a salad. Once we had eaten we came back home and had yet another cuppa. When Sam had gone to collect Flower from school I went down to the stables to sort Mouse out, the owner of the yard was hay bailing hay in one of the front fields, it smells lovely even if a little dusty. Tonight we are having a film night, Litlun, Beth, Sam and Flower are coming round we are having some snacky bits to eat and watching some DVDs a nice end to the day.

four legs

I don't sleep well when my husband is away and although he isn't far, he's not here so last night was no exception, I was still reading at half past midnight, then this morning I was up at six thirty, not through choice though.
Once up I decided to take the dog for a walk, I took her to a park that, if my husband had decided to go for a run before breakfast, he would have gone to. Very sad I know but I have only seen him fleetingly over the last week or so, and wouldn't be married to him if I didn't want to be with him.
He didn't go for a run and I didn't see him, but I did get the dog walked early and as I was on a roll I went straight to the stables and did mouse, she has a new habit, on her tummy she sometimes gets flies settling (its a sort of hair free patch so it probably sweats and the flies go for it, all the mares seem to get it) well I had started to brush all the flies off before spraying the anti fly spray and she has got used to it when I get there now she walks over to me and slightly past me and stretches its so funny, the problem is she loves it when her tummy is groomed and leans over, when my husband went up to see her with me the other day she nearly fell over. Having groomed and sprayed her I mucked out the field and went back home.
Today I agreed to do a shift with the private ambulance service at a race course, I really am not keen on watching horse racing but this was at least on the flat and I was working crowd side so I didn't have to watch them.
Stupidly I watched the first race on the TV inside the medical room, the horses were being started in traps, it took them ages to get one particular horse in, it was running backwards and in the end they practically lifted its rear end in. that's when things got bad! the trap was shut and the horse reared up panicking, the jockey jumped across to get away and the horse went up again coming down with its front legs over the adjoining trap, that jockey got out too as the horse flailed about, one of the strappers jumped on it as it managed to get back into its own trap and they opened the back and got it out. After the race was started the vet tried to get it into the horse ambulance but by now it wasn't having any of it. The next thing we saw was the horse being led down the track with one of its front legs bandaged.
Fortunately this was the only (to my knowledge) injury/accident involving a horse at that meeting,it is also the first one I have seen on flat racing at that track.
Once back home Litlun and I had our dinner sat watching Alice in wonderland, which I think I will have to watch again to decide if I like it or not!

Lunch at the Palace

What a day!
Today was the last day that I spend with my husband as Mr and Mrs! Next time I see him we will be The Reverend and Mrs.
We both set off to go to the Bishops palace at ten past twelve and found a jam of cars outside which we added our car to. Once inside we found several of my husbands fellow uni students and some from other Uni's. The Ordinands (those who are going to be Ordained either Deacon or, if they have done their Deacon year, Priest all had name badges, we were given coffee or tea and chatted amongst ourselves until we were called in to lunch, the food was lovely, we had Salmon and or Chicken with green salad, warm new potatoes, tomato and onion salad, coleslaw and Quiche.
Dessert was either Chocolate mousse or strawberries with cream.
After this all the Ordinands were sent to one place whilst the spouses were sent to another. We were told about a spouses group which is a cross between a club and a support group, (or at least that's how it sounded) to be honest I don't think I am one of the "in crowd" and don't think I would fit in somehow! Still there were four of us who knew each other from the uni do's and we all took each others email address' I think this will be of more benefit to me as we all at least are on the same wave length.
After this talk we went back to have some coffee, I got a quick glimpse of my husband before he had to go ( they gave him no warning, just asked if he was there so he didn't even have a chance to say goodbye, very sad!)
Having finished my coffee I said goodbye to the others I was with and drove home, feeling quite sorry for my self!
Litlun and I had dinner together (Beth was working) and then our priest came round to make sure I was OK which was a rather nice thing to do, he had a cup of tea with us before going back home.
Now its off to bed. I wonder what my husband is doing right now?

British Grand Prix

After my night shift I came home and went straight to bed, My husband had left on Friday to do his very last residential weekend with his theological uni, on Friday, the girls were at work and my mums so you would have thought the house would be nice and quiet for a good sleep.... the dog barked at the postman and then the phone rang!! In the end I gave up. Storm and I were going to Silverstone for the GP and had decided to sleep in the car in a layby or something. I got up and sorted out the car had some lunch then made sure all the animals were OK before driving round to pick Storm up.
We drove to Silverstone leisurely as we had plenty of time, and as neither of us had been before we thought we would go straight there to check it out for the following morning, as we got to the roundabout there were some security staff stood there. Storm said "Ask them where the nearest place to park up for the night would be"
the security girl said "You can park in this car park behind me if you like!"
Storm and I grinned, we parked in the car park which was right by the entrance to the event! sorted out the seats in the back of the car and got sleeping bags out.
I hadn't bargained on getting much sleep, what with comings and goings from the event and an obvious party within the event, and the fact that we were squashed into the back of my car (even though it is quite spacious) but we both managed to get to sleep. We woke up at about 6:30, got up got changed washed and had breakfast of tea and croissant, very civilised considering! Whilst we were having breakfast one of the security staff came and asked us to move the car into the other half of the car park which wasn't tarmacked as they were using the tarmac one for motorbikes.
After moving the car we went into the event.
As neither of us had been before we just wandered around for the first couple of hours getting our bearings before grabbing another cuppa then looking round the manufacturer's village, Storm got a Rossi flag, towel and mini helmet, I think she might like Rossi!!
Then we went off to see Dougie Lampkin do a short display, he is my favorite biker of any discipline so I was really pleased when he signed my ticket and Storm took a photo of me with him.
We wandered around again before deciding to go to club corner to watch the GP. What an excellent spot we chose, as we didn't have grandstand tickets we had to watch form the hill, not easy to get photos! but after the first lap the very nice security staff told us we could go and watch from in the grandstand as there were loads of free seats, but if any one came in with our seat numbers we would have to move. How cool was that?? it was the corner most accidents happened on! fortunately they were all OK, most of the accidents happened in two of the other races and not the GP, it also seemed to be the point in the track where the riders would attempt scary over/undertakes.
Well as expected Lorenzo won, unfortunately for Storm Rossi wasn't there as he had broken his leg in the last GP in Italy.
We then watched the 125cc race where the local lad came 3rd, before we headed home.

Fathers day

HAPPY FATHERS DAY DAD. XXXXX

Ambulances Stacking

Well! Talk about dragging its feet, my day shift got off to a hectic start and really didn't get any better, although I was working with my part time crew mate Scott who has been away on leave and what with one thing or another I haven't worked with at all this year until now. We were extremely busy even though right now I can't bring to mind any job of interest, that led on into my night shifts, as this week is my relief week I don't follow the usual two days two nights pattern I'm used to and this time round I got one day and three nights (gulp) I am not good at nights at the best of times but three is a killer. Fortunately I had swapped one of them earlier in the month with another of my crew mates and have already done the shift so she is doing the third shift for me (phew). The two nights were no better than the day and to be honest probably worse, we did manage to get the whole half an hour meal break but that was about it. We took a patient in to one hospital and fortunately just had a Minor case, if we had been taking our patient into majors we would have been stacking. There were three resus's going on at one point, one of which was a 29 year old! As we came out there were 9 ambulances stacking! As we booked clear we immediately got another job (not surprising as all the ambulances in the area were waiting at the hospital!) this patient also needed hospital treatment but at a hospital 15 miles away, when we got there it was pretty much empty, very strange. our last job of the night (early hours) was to pick up a patient from a vehicle which had broken down 26 miles away and take him and the police escort a further 12 miles to a predetermined hospital then travel back from that hospital to our base station, so that would have been a 72 mile round trip, with a stop to transfer the patient onto our stretcher and get a hand over from the crew, then give the receiving hospital a handover and transfer the patient onto a bed. This was not a blue light drive which meant normal road speeds, and we received the job at 0430am, and were due to finish at 0700. Well we did the first leg of the journey to the broken down ambulance then found out that the crew and the police had devised a plan of action (as they had been waiting for so long due to the amount of emergency calls we have been getting) So we were no longer required, what a stroke of luck! Eventually we got back to base and the day crew arrived and I was able to finish my shift, for two weeks of annual leave, but I'm not kidding myself, even though it will be leave and for the most part exciting I know the first week is going to be hectic!

Calm before the storm

The last couple of days have been rather slow, which has been really nice, but I am aware that it is the calm before the storm! and what a storm it will be!! Together with my husband we have been delivering some of the invitations to his ordination which will take place during Petertide (26th June to be precise!) so it has been rather nice to drop invitations in and have an occasional cuppa with people along the way, in fact it has been really nice, I get to spend some calm relaxed time with friends AND my husband which, due to our shift work and normally hectic lifestyle is a very rare thing. Yesterday evening Flower came over as normal, she had made some rice crispy cakes with marshmallow in for us, yummy. Each day I have been down to do Mouse, when I say do I mean groom and spray her with bug spray and muck out the field there isn't much else to do. My husband is on his second night tonight and I am off to work tomorrow morning before he gets home so I won't see him until tomorrow night. So from 4.45 when I get up tomorrow morning the storm is brewing, starting with work, then together with my friend Storm (what a fitting name for this next couple of weeks!!) I am off to the Moto GP whilst my husband attends his final residential weekend, then . . . . well lets just wait and see how it all pans out. For now I am enjoying the last few hours of relaxation.

Race for Life part 2

Today, along with five other members of my family, I did the race for life. Last year I was one of the ambulance staff that provided medical cover for one of their events, but having had a cancer scare before Christmas I decided to actually take part in it, My Mum, two daughters, daughter in law and Granddaughter all decided that they too wanted to take part. So all dressed in pink tee shirts and pyjama bottoms we set off to do the 5k race for life nearest to us. It was a hot day but just for the duration of the race there seemed to be a nice cool breeze just taking the edge off. We each had a bottle of water to take round with us and we set off at 11am. We took one hour four minutes and twenty five seconds to complete the race, not bad really seeing as we decided to all stay together and the Oldest of us is 75 and the youngest 5. We all agreed that we had a good time, the atmosphere was brilliant, and the look on my Granddaughters face when she was handed a medal at the finish post was priceless. We drove back to my house and all had a cup of tea before heading off to do our own things. Fantastic day. Thank you to every one who has sponsored us.

Quick turn around.

It was only Sunday night that I was on a night shift for another of my crew mates so coming back to work my own shifts on Tuesday and Wednesday seemed rather a quick turn around! The two days I have just completed have been dominated by self harm and suicide attempts, with a record number for me yesterday of 3 suicide attempts in one shift! Two of these people had also tried on the previous day. Almost every job we went to we had the police there already, (good job too in the case of one who was using a shiny new Stanley knife!) To be honest I'm not sure whether the Stanley knife or the Glock carried by the armed policeman was more scary! Still we all lived happily ever after! Today I start my two nights, I am never very eager to go in for nights I am too fond of my bed and a good nights sleep, but we all go in hoping for a good shift, and ultimately we are all disappointed by the end of it, but by then its too late!

Two of my unfavorite things?!

Last night I did a shift for one of my crew mates, who is going to do a shift for me in a couple of weeks time.
When I have a shift to do with someone I don't usually work with I always hope its a nice shift with easy jobs which I can do without too much ado.... Last night our first job combined two of my least favorite things ( actually the two things that scare me the most!) and that was Paediatric (child) jobs and choking jobs. We were to transfer a baby from one hospital into London to a dedicated Paediatric hospital, well what can I say, thank goodness I was driving for the first half of the shift and my crew mate was a paramedic, a CTL none less (clinical team leader). Stroke of luck that!
The journey was remarkably unexciting, the thing about London driving is people tend to use their rear view mirrors more so we had a clear run, the final stretch of the journey running along the banks of the Thames which at that time of night was well lit, including the Millennium wheel, London eye not that I had time to look. Our patient arrived at the receiving hospital well rested and asleep.
It is an amazing looking building made almost totally of glass and as our baby was going to the 5th floor we had some awesome views.
Getting back out of London was a different story no blues and twos so it was a stop start trip taking far longer.
The rest of the shift was pretty uneventful with the rest of our patients going into local hospitals.
Whats more we managed to finish on time yay.

Playing catch up.

Just recently I have been very lazy about writing my blog, well, maybe not lazy just not allowing myself the time to do it! These last few weeks have been manic, I have been having job interviews (I can write that now I have got the job!) and medicals (for the afore mentioned job), I have been doing extra shifts at work, trying to bring in a bit of extra money, Litlun had several orthodontic appointments, she now has fixed braces on her top and bottom teeth! Then there's the normal family stuff and the animals. . . Ok, so all of the above is a bunch of (true but never the less..) excuses! I did manage to find time to have a couple of nice outings... It was my mums Birthday a couple of weeks ago, so we decided to take the dogs down to the beach then have a fish and chip takeaway for dinner, It ended up that Litlun, my granddaughter and her mum came and my brother his wife and two kids and their dog came along too so it was a lovely evening, even if my dog and my brothers dog don't get on too well. It was lovely and warm, the tide was out which meant the dogs had plenty of beach to run on, and once we eventually got to the sea and paddled it was also warm. Flower and Litlun collected shells and made sand castles and when my brothers daughter arrived she joined in too. It was a lovely evening just a pity my Husband had to be in London for his Ordination training. The other outing we had was to an open air museum which was having a working animal display, there were heavy horses, working dogs and loads of stalls together with all the normal things the museum offers. It was a hot day we took a huge picnic which we all contributed to one way or another, there were supposed to be seven of us, but one family couldn't make it for some reason. so it was just my Mum, my granddaughter her mum, me and the two dogs. (My husband was at work and the girls were both out with friends!) Flower and her mum Vikki had a horse and cart ride while mum and I stayed in the shade with the dogs, we watched heavy horse displays and dog displays, a vintage horse drawn fire engine display, then we went and found a shady spot to have our picnic after which we wandered around the stalls and had home traditional homemade ice cream, which was delicious, before heading home for a cuppa.

On yer bike....

Last night I realised that I had no petrol in the car, so instead of filling up I decided to cycle to the stables, which meant getting the bike out, (poor bike hasn't seen the light of day for years!)which meant pumping up the tyres, dusting off the dead spiders cobwebs and all the other debris that has accumilated over the years.
I then had to find my helmet... fortunately Litlun couldnt find hers recently so she borrowed mine, that was not full of cobwebs and dead bugs (phew!)
I set my alarm for 7 30am, and when it went off this morning I immediately remembered that I was going to cycle to the stables, turned the alarm off and went back to sleep, well, it did seem the better option by far!
Eventually, half an hour later I got up and by half past eight I was cycling to the stables which is about an 8 mile round trip.
Normally when I arrive Mouse hears the car and gives a welcoming whinny, today she didn't know I was there until she heard me say hello to one of the other horse owners, and I might add this was after several minutes, I think I need to back track a little, I arrived in the yard and attempted to get off the bike, the best way I found of doing this was to fall sideways then stagger off before I fell over, I wondered if I would be able to actually walk Mouse out to the field or if it might be better to sit down for five minutes and have a cup of tea (we have everything at the stables, well we have a kettle at any rate). I decided that I should put the kettle on then take Mouse slowly out to her field and finish making the tea when I got back.
I am extremely lucky to have such a laid back horse, she just walked nicely out to the field and I was able to slowly walk back to the yard and pretend that the kettle was taking ages to boil, when infact I was just trying to decide whether my legs would carry me to the stable again and actually allow me to muck out or maybe round to the hay barn to have a lie down. (I am joking now) I would like to point out that I always have a cuppa whilst doing the stable, and the cycle ride although there are one or two slight inclines, was nowhere near as bad as I made out. In fact I really enjoyed the cycle, it was lovely and cool but bright and sunny, perfect.
Having mucked out, made up Mouses hay nets water bucket and feeds I got back on the bike to do the return journey, I decided to time myself, not because I wanted to rush back, I certainly did not wish to rush back, but I just wondered how long I would take. Back home in 15 minutes, not bad seeing as I was only pooteling along. I have a feeling I am going to be very stiff on Wednesday... and my days exercise is not over yet....
Aikido tonight.
I found this cartoon online it belongs to Stuart McMillen

Blood

Well that's another tour done, two days and two nights! Quite interesting they were too, on my first day I had to have a meeting regarding the amount of time off sick I have had, it makes me laugh really, to ensure I could be at work I just took the days off I needed for all the tests I was having before Christmas, which meant I had been off sick on seven separate occasions!
The service I work for is the most uncaring caring profession I have ever known, but I am not going to rant on about all its miss givings today I might store them up for a later date, Suffice to say that if I am ever ill again and require tests the service will get one massive block of sickness off as I will ensure I am booked off for the whole lot as this seems to be what the service wants!
Other than that we did have some very interesting jobs, and I seem to have done the full rounds going to pretty much every hospital in our area (and a couple of others besides) Our jobs ranged from a four month old baby with testicular torsion, which had to be blue lighted into a large London hospital, an elderly gentleman who had a circulation problem in his leg due to a hip problem, to an epistaxis (nosebleed) which I had to prioritise into the receiving hospital due to the fact he was on Warfarin and had lost so much blood.
On my last night shift I also went to a blood loss job, in fact I think it may have been the worse blood loss I have ever seen on an alive patient! He was a self harmer, he had decided to cut through his arm and managed to hit an artery, the clots and blood were everywhere and we really didn't want to put the kit down or touch anything. His blood pressure was in his boots and for the third time that night we found ourselves prioritising our patient into hospital. I think the theme of this tour could either be Blood loss or nose bleeds, as I think I responded to three nose bleeds and saw at least another two crews bringing patients in that clearly had also had them.
As for Friday night I think the theme was police, as every job we did we either required them or they had called us, including one where two teenagers had absconded from a children's home, one had managed to badly cut her face, (possible self harm, taking the rest of her face and arms into the equation) they both absconded from the hospital before they had been assessed let alone treated, I think they may have realised that we had called the police, because some of the things they were telling us just didn't add up!
Even on our way back to base we required the police as we were following a car which was so obviously driven by someone who was over the limit it was laughable! She had trouble keeping it on the road let alone on her side of it!! Needless to say we kept behind at a good distance, as we didn't want her hitting us.

Marley

Today I was going to blog about the walk I took with the dog in the most amazing bluebell woods I have ever seen. But, ( I was always told you couldn't start a sentence with "but" so I am going to!) But, today I had a phone call from my husband who told me he had bumped into one of our friends during the course of his work and that her dog had died. She had a full of life 10 month old black Labrador, he was into every thing and full of fun. We had taken him for walks together in the fields where she lives and I know he will be very sadly missed. He had managed to get to some slug pellets, apparently just one or two can be fatal to a dog! Sadly in this case they were. Whilst on the subject of slugs, these also can cause problems for dogs as they carry lung worm which can also be fatal to dogs. It seems you can't win sometimes. Three years ago we lost our Jack Russell to an adder bite, according to the vet 50% of dogs are killed by the venom of adders and sadly 50% of dogs are also allergic to the anti venom, yet another can't win situation! Today's blog is posted in memory of Marley and Milo. RIP my little friends.

Nothing lasts forever.

When I was ill a while back, I went down to Somerset to a place called Compton Durville and spent three days with the sisters of the Community of St Francis (CSF).
Nothing was expected of me, I didn't have to go to church 6 times a day or walk around in silence with my head bowed and eyes lowered. I was able to go out for long walks, across the fields and footpaths, there was a library a television room and a chapel and a small shop which sold everything from chocolate to handbags.
I spent most of the time outside in the wild garden and walking, and also sketching.
The atmosphere was so calm and relaxing that when I returned home I was much better. I decided to try and go back at least once a year just to relax and get away from the usual rush of things.
I have just found out that it is closing, after 50 years, and the CSF sisters are all going to different places through out the UK. It seems such a shame as it was such a relaxing and peaceful place to go to escape.
I have posted some photos, for me as much as anyone, and I hope that they all settle happily into their new homes.
I will now begin the search for another quiet relaxing place, any ideas welcome.

Call an ambulance!!

I have just finished my set of four shifts, two days followed by two nights, and it never ceases to amaze me just what people call us out to, and their reasons for calling us too!
This tour I was called out for a 21 year old with period pains! (boyfriends car was in the drive), we were also called to a lady with a UTI (wee infection), by her son who had driven over to see her and followed us up to the hospital in his car. When I realised what he had done I asked him why he hadn't taken her himself he said, "well if she goes in by ambulance she gets seen quicker" I quickly put him right and told him that we were being run ragged by people like him who thought this would happen, and by doing this he could very well be causing a genuine emergency to have to wait longer for an ambulance, to which he replied "I pay my taxes I, I pay your wages! I have just as much right to call an ambulance", To which (we had just had the worse night shift) my crew mate replied in which case its about time you gave us a pay rise!
As we greened up from this job we were immediately given another to an elderly lady with severe breathing difficulties. We brought this patient also, to the same hospital and were prioritised through to the resus department. The son of the UTI patient began to complain that we had said something to the staff which had stopped his mother being seen in order, to which one of the nursing staff said every patient is triaged (assessed for urgency) and as my patient had a life threatening condition and seeing as he could have called a GP or out of hours Dr out to see his mother, he didn't have anything to complain about.
As I have mentioned before every patient is assessed and the more urgent cases are obviously seen first, people seem to think that if they go into hospital by ambulance they will automatically be seen first, the sooner people realise that this is not the case the better it will be for the genuine EMERGENCIES.
I have no problem scooping little old ladies up when they fall out of bed, this is an emergency, if they were to stay on the floor all night or even all day their circulation and general well being will be affected, but when I am called out to a non emergency and there are two or three cars in the drive and at least one sober driver, just because they think they will be seen quicker then please don't expect me or my crew mate to be overly impressed! We won't be!!
My first night shift was I think the busiest night shift I have ever had, I had reached the point where I was worried that I might fall asleep at the wheel on the drive home. Fortunately I didn't and I managed to get a good 5 hours sleep that day before going back for my second night.

Harping back...

The other day I mentioned how fast we seem to be living these days, and I have just realised how much I have managed to cram into my morning already. I got up at 8am, which was rather nice as I am normally up earlier than this, I let the dog out, fed her breakfast, did the rabbit then drove down to the stables to do Mouse, I decided that I would take her for a walk down the road today as it was nice and the roads weren't to busy, Having given her a quick groom we set off, the ducks on the mill pond were being fed some bread so there was quacking and flapping going on there, then three dirt type bikes drove past followed by some racing bikes, then just as we were nearing home again three horses from our yard came out going in the opposite direction, did she care about any of this? No she just looked and didn't even check her stride, we even passed under a creaky pub sign which she didn't worry about either, (may have to see how she feels about going in for a quick half next time (^: ).
I think I should point out here that she is not yet three years old and unbroken, which is why she was not ridden out.
Then once back I turned her out mucked out the field, did her stable made up her feeds for the next two days and came home. Then Beth and I took the dog to the station to see how she would search in a smoke smelling dark indoor environment (the Breathing apparatus chamber ) she did two searches and did very well, Thanks to my husband and Bomber for being willing MisPers. Back home I had some lunch and uploaded the photos that Beth had taken (in the dark) of the search.
All in all a busy but enjoyable morning.
The two photos were taken as pot luck shots in the dark, as although we had a torch it was very dark.

The Marathon!

Today Beth has a friend over and the whole of their day is to be spent doing a marathon.... I would like to point out that her friend has a back and ankle injury and has been going stir crazy at home for the last three weeks. Still the marathon seemed to be in order, the pair of them prepared well, plenty of coke to drink and some sustenance for the marathon ahead of them, pringles, chipsticks and the old favorite... Dairy milk chocolate!! Oh yes this would see them through the miles and miles .................................. ......................................................................................................... of disc footage of Johnny Depp films that they were about to take on, they started off with Sweeney Todd, then Chocolat then threw 300 into the pot for good measure then back to Johnny for Pirates of the Caribbean 1. they did also stop half way for a roast dinner. Well done girls.

Slow down.

Today is the first of May!
When I turned the calendar over this morning my husband said "Its not May yet!" I just gave him the 'there, there, there' look, he grinned and checked the date. Then he looked up at me and with a strange look of mingled fear and excitement he said...."I'm being ordained next month!"
Is it because we try to fit so much in to our day, week, month now that time seems to have sped up or am I just getting old! Good grief!
Sometimes I think it would be nice to look at the calendar and say, I have a free day (actually I would like a free week but that is really asking something. Even when we go away on holiday we try and fill the days with sight seeing and keeping the kids amused. I could never understand why people took three or four books and just sat on the beach reading all day (and I am a book worm).
I think I get it now though, I don't think its all about catching the sun, not completely, I think its about recharging the batteries and slowing the pace down. The fact that I will never be able to sit on the beach all day for a week, because I want to explore the surroundings is beside the point, maybe when I am old and can't climb the nearest mountain just because its there or ride into the desert on a camel just because I haven't done it before, maybe then, just for a day or two, I might sit on the beach and read a book.

EeeAwwww

The law is an ass!
I would like to point out that this is only my opinion, which I believe I am entitled to have!
What right does a country have to state that an item of clothing cannot be worn?
I am of course referring to the buqa (burkha). Its not as if it is such a scanty item that a persons assets(!) are on display... Bikini, Mankini!!!... It doesn't have any bad language emblazon across it, and its not advertising anything illegal. I am sure there would be public outcry if bikinis, rude tee shirts or clothing bearing adverts were to be banned. This seems to me like yet another excuse to persecute a particular group of people. I wonder what the next item on the list will be? Why cant politicians get their own houses in order and start working on serious issues and leave what people wear up to the individual.

Banging around

Bish was on nights last night, fortunately he didn't have a bad shift, because when I got back from the stables this morning at 9am there were builders in next door drilling and banging, fitting a new kitchen! The noise is really deafening, I am hoping they are quick workers and finish what they are doing really quickly because its already driving me mad. I do have a low tolerance to things like that though, so maybe its good for me! (sarcasm there!) Still if Bish had been on job after job last night he would have needed to get some sleep today and would have been less than impressed with that racket, at one point we thought they were going to end up in the bathroom!
Storm text to see if I would like to take the dog out with her two, we took them for a wander through the woods where we do our search and rescue training, then when we got back I sorted out a few things on her computer for her whilst having a coffee and a Viennese whirl, my favorite.
After cooking the dinner I went down to the yard to put Mouse to bed.
All in all a very mixed day, I hope they will have finished banging around tomorrow so that normal noise levels will be resumed.

Election

I know more about the ministry of magic than I do about the houses of parliament.
That is the title of a group on facebook, I joined the group just as a laugh, but then realised that it is probably true! whats more its probably true about a lot of the people who will be voting at this up coming election. Rather a worrying thought really....I mean Cornelius Fudge didn't do a very good job when he was minister for magic, and Dumbledore is dead..... that just leaves Percy Weasley and we all know what a jobsworth he is! Ahh well I guess we will have to stick to, Brown, Cameron or Clegg...... maybe one of the two that aren't elected could run for Minister of Magic! now theres a thought.

out to lunch part 2

I did manage to stay up to see Bish when he got in last night (haven't stopped yawning all day though!) This morning when I got to the stables Mouse was much happier and when I let her into the paddock she ran around with the red pony for a short while before she got her head down to the serious business of eating. I have been driving around with a very bald tyre on my car so having ordered a new one I went to have it put on £60 later I drove to mums where we walked the two dogs down to a grassy plateau they played with tennis balls while mum and I had a picnic lunch and put the world to rights. Once home my husband told me that the church was not going to allow him to do a single year at his theological college to get his BA, but that it wanted him to do a further 4 years study at a different venue to get the same BA. Great!! that will be another 4 years of no holidays and him having to study all the time, why don't they get the concept of family life!! Anyway enough of that, I must get on with the dinner.

Out to lunch....

When I got to the stables this morning I found mouse's hay net still hanging up outside! Poor girl hadn't had any hay all night. I let her out and not surprisingly she put her head straight down to graze.
Having dropped Flower off at school I got ready to go up country a short way to meet a friend for lunch, he is a parish priest, so I travelled up to his parish and we went to a pub a short distance away called the gardeners arms. The service was excellent as was the food, and it goes without saying that the company was too. After eating and catching up we went for a walk around a huge reservoir it was so warm and sunny, there were a pair of grebes on the water and loads of different butterflies it was lovely. When we got back to the rectory we had a cup of tea then I left to come home as he had work to do.
I drove straight to the stables to muck out hay, feed and water then bring Mouse in, before I left I did a double check that she did have everything she needed for the night.
When I got in it was just Beth and Litlun at home as Bish was in London at Uni he won't get in until gone eleven, but I will try and stay awake to see him.