This week was supposed to be prosaic and a bit dull. After last week’s coughing frenzy, I wanted a quiet, easy week and I thought that’s what I got but as it turned out, it was quite eventful, it was also the first week in ages when I felt well and got things done because I had the physical and emotional energy to do them.
Monday morning commute, honestly it was nice to be up to it.
Rainy October evenings are not fun.
Boiler replacement happened on Tuesday and Wednesday. Which meant that the cupboards either side of the washing machine and surfaces needed to be cleared on Monday night. Not pictured is everything piled up on the kitchen table! I got home on Wednesday to find the plumber having a nightmare and the news that I had no heating (not too much of a problem) or hot water (bigger problem). I do know that many, if not the majority, of the human race survives without regular access to running water, let alone hot running water and not having it for one night was a completely survivable, first world problem and once I had put the pants of perspective on, I was just grumbly about the amount of chaos that two workmen can do to one tiny, tidy flat! I kept walking into rooms and needing to re-arrange things or tidy up!
On Wednesday it was all done and my kitchen went back to the tidy, organised space it usually is although it did take me a while to work out where the thermostat was and how to programme the timer!
There was team building this week too. On Thursday, the team went to Swingers for drinks and miniature golf.
After Thursdsay I was ready for the weekend so having to get up and go to work on Friday was a bit of a let down. However, I was glad to have done a complete five day week at work so all good.
Saturday started early for a 9am eye test, good news is no change in my eyesight, so no need for new glasses, which is a relief, my glasses are not cheap!
My plan was eye test, library, home, allotment. Alas I was early for the library, so I went to Tescos, where I bumped into Sue and had a brief catch up. Then I went to the library, which opened late!
Books returned I walked home and then went to the allotment. Ma and I spent 4 hours, Ma weeded the top end and I dug over the bottom, we laid down weed fabric and I moved the rhubarb and the lavender. It was a beautiful day and there was a tiny bit of produce too!
On Sunday, I got to grips with the flat. Mostly the bedroom and the living room because they are the most neglected in terms of housework. I feel much better for it.
Sarah R came round for a catch up on Sunday afternoon and Chelsea won 4-0, a good end to a good week.
The bed at the front of this photo and the two raised beds in the background (covered with green netting) are all planted up with onions and garlic.
This was were the first courgettes and the french beans were this year and it the bit of the allotment that is next to Joe’s allotment. I was going to dig over and sow green manure but when Ma and I took the sweet peas and metal frame up, we made a new plan. Current thinking is that we are going to cover with weed fabric and at some point before March, hopefully before Christmas this will be home to three raised beds (
At the top of the plot, we need to move the rhubarb and the poorly lavender bushes. Once we’ve done that we want to mark out where the patio for the shed will be and cover that with weed suppressing fabric and mark out some areas at the top for re-siting the gooseberry bushes and wildflowers and so on.
May 2016
All shopping this week was done at Lidl on Friday night and the cost was £8.53. Not pictured but bought later in the week was a fruit salad and two packets of pasta which came to £3. So the total for the week was £11.53
Oli and I made a loaf of bread on Saturday night, which was the basis of our bacon sandwiches on Sunday morning.
I didn’t eat dinner on Sunday night, I did over the course of the weekend eat a packet of mini salamis. Living my best life right there.
Dinner was fishfingers and courgettes
On Thursday, I was still sick and ate leftover pasta for lunch and baked potatoes, chilli and broccoli for dinner (thank heavens for the freezer!)
On Friday, courgette pizza and garlic bread.
It was something more for me than just basic unhappiness because I was struggling to feel God’s presence in my life. My belief in God is one of the most basic building blocks of who I am, the sense that I’m living, as best I’m able, the life that God wants for me, isn’t even a question, it’s just who I am. Even when it’s difficult, when I was unemployed, when Stef died and when I was depressed, I knew that, hard as it was, I was meant to be doing what I was doing and that I didn’t understand it but it would come right. That God was with me. I was possibly the most optimistic depressed person in the world. I knew that I would get through it if I just kept on and I did.
I wasn’t lacking faith, so much as relationship and the things I normally do when I’m in a bad spot where not working. Last year, I spent six weeks more or less trapped in the flat. On the one hand it was nice to have the rest despite the foot pain and not being able to shower but on the other it was clear that without my mother, I’d have been absolutely buggered and pretty isolated. I came into 2016, knowing that something needed to change but not being at all sure what needed changing or how to change it.
Lidl, Tesco and Sainsburys the total spend was £14.15.
