i must stop doing this

no, no capitals and only a photo if the wind blows in the right direction…

  i've done it again, fallen off my bike and broken something.  i mean, i don't do it every three months or so but this is the second time since i've been writing this blog
.attention seeking, perhaps.

 this time it really wasn't my fault or that of the other woman who fell off with me  , either.
we were waiting to cross a small side road when a car cut straight across in front of us, got out and checked his paintwork, bellowed  'sorry dames', got back in and drove off at speed , leaving the two of us and two bystanders stunned. i thought i was alright and actually rode off, but within half an hour i realised that , thanks to the new blood thinners,  my  left pinkie wasn't just a bit sore, it stuck out at a right angle and was dark, dark blue and sausage shaped. and a neighbour decided to drive me to the emergency dept. luckily reminding me , before we left, to take my ring off.

since there was a  procession of genuine emergencies all evening,  i finally insisted that she went home and i ended up hanging around till midnight, being bumped by sick children and 90 year-old grandmothers of fifteen. but eventually the fact that my pinkie looked as though it would explode led to about ten x-rays and a ginormous heaving and hauling by two nurses which has made it all look a bit better and feel more finger-like in an odd shaped plaster of paris. it does definitely feel a little better this evening but i'm to be checked out tomorrow by the pre-op people and will be put in a more permanent one on Friday.

 all because speedy gonzales took a corner far too fine. i hope he goes bald and bandy legged by the weekend.  and no, i didn't know the other woman…but i do hope she did better than me.

The Capsule Wardrobe

Do you remember when a key article every summer in every women's magazine was  " What To Pack For Your Holidays "? Then it just depended on whether you were headed to a week in Frinton, a fortnight in Torquay or a month in the Highlands. Whatever the destination, sunburn would probably occur and a rain hat might be carried by at least one of the party.

 Not everybody went to the sea-side of course. Maybe your granny lived in the country, maybe you had an aunty in Ireland but nearly everybody went somewhere. And , wherever you went, you took a heavy suitcase with you and there would be at least a couple of new things in it.

I was thinking of this on Friday as Younger Daughter and I wandered through the Amsterdam Uniclo on the way to my train. It's recently opened and I do like their clothes but I couldn't help feeling that, now I don't work, I really don't need to buy anything anymore. I've got a couple of warm coats and plenty of jumpers. I've still got dozens of T-shirts, since working with small children we'd be covered in sticky finger prints regularly. I've got plenty of jeans. I don't get dressed up any more.

 I'm obviously getting old.

 But really, more than anything else, we'd just spent an hour in the Historic Museum admiring a tiny collection of their Georgian and Victorian clothes. Only 75 items in all, each exquisite. And I found the Perfect Dress. If I could I would just wear this for ever more....... Isn't it heavenly?

Yawn...

Have you noticed? When someone asks you these days what you do with all the spare time you've got now you're retired, it's no use just saying that you read or knit. Unless you're walking to Compostela with Miriam Margolies or doing a Ph.D, no one will be remotely interested. You can try to mention a talk you went to ( was it really in February?  ) or a magnificent exhibition but nothing short of reporting that you've been volunteering at the South Pole will do. And it'll be useless without photos.

In my defence, I must say I have done the odd interesting thing when young… but since I don't have selfies of them I suppose they don't count. Even when Smaller Grandson went to a nearby Elizabethan Manor with his class a couple of weeks ago, they all stood there visibly dressed up as pirates … Middle Daughter even made a red coat and an eye patch for him ...so they were definitely there. Lots of snaps of tricorns  and stripey teeshirts.  I can remember the odd memorable Christmas … being in a banana plantation one Christmas for instance or people skating over lakes on another but I can't whip out my 'Phone and show them … ? So was it even real?

Many years ago, I was very fond of an old lady who'd been everywhere, long before the days before gap years. I remember watching television with her and every so often there would be an "I've been there" from her chair, usually over Pondicherri , Mombasa or Cape Town. Generations of the family could do it .Come to that, my grandfather could say it about Archangel or the Dardanelles .

Never mind, life now offers other excitement… I've had housepainters on the balcony all morning.  Full volume weather reports, local traffic reports and local ads. adding a bit of background to  all the goss. from the local football club, where they're going on holiday and what they did last weekend, with photos …  and tacky railings./ So remember, the next time you're queueing up for the peak of Mount Everest or windsurfing off Patagonia, take a PHOTO.
( A statue of Thomas Cook at Leicester Station)