Monday Miscellany: Just the worst news

Posted on September 15, 2025 by nicdempsey

Happy Monday!

1. Last week we finally got Ma an NHS appointment for her brain issues. The dr was lovely and confirmed a progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP) diagnosis. The doctor didn’t sugar coat it for us, movement, balance, vision, speech, and swallowing and it will also affect her reasoning. It sucks and PSP, unlike Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s, is a fast disease and the average time of death from diagnosis is about 5 to 6 years. Mum has handled everything this past year, including this news with such grace and resolve, I am in awe of how she has and continued to cope. She has always been the person I most admire and this hasn’t changed that. This space started as a place that I use for me, a sort of diary and motivation when I’m at my lowest, I try to be careful about what I share about other people, and while my mum is has always been present here because I spend so much time with her, I’m not going to share much more than I have about her condition, because as we have been saying for a while ‘autonomy is important’ and that doesn’t change because Mum is ill. It will change a lot of how I live and I will probably talk about that!

2. The sudden return to British weather has been shocking but welcome, especially now I have a new raincoat but even I have been taken aback but the amount of sunshine and rain at the same time has been happening this week!

Sunshine and rain, oh joy!

3. With the situation with Mum, everyone keeps talking to me about how I have to find time for myself and not do too much for Mum. I’m not discounting that advice but I’m going to do as much as I can for Mum for as long as I can. We are a long time dead and I’m going to spend time with her while I can. I am making sure that sleep is a priority but I am also making sure that I have time to do things that are good for me too. Which is why I was so happy to spend time with Sue and Kathy this week and some rainy allotment time. Rest doesn’t always look like doing nothing!

New Dahlia

4. Sometimes in a bad week, seed mail is the best mail.

New Seeds

5. There is a new nosy cat, in my road, I had to spent some time chucking them out of my flat this weekend as they kept rushing by me as I opened the front door

Mystery cat

I hope you have the best week you can!

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Sunday Music: Sunday Kind of Love – Ella Fitzgerald

Posted on September 14, 2025 by nicdempsey

I’ve been at Mum’s quite a lot during the week and at 10am she switches over to Radio 3. I do not understand this but it is her house! Something was playing and it was Ella and I didn’t know or particularly like the song but I knew it was Ella. I’m not at all knowledgeable about Ella Fitzgerald but I can almost always identify her singing, I do love her voice.

So I was thinking about Ella and everything is very autumnal and I thought about this song because it feels autumnal

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Recommended: Phone and Watch Charger

Posted on September 13, 2025 by nicdempsey

For 2025 I got an Apple watch, it’s great but it needs charging far more than my old fitbit did. I have a cable for my watch and my phone, but I was getting tired of the mess of them on my bedside chest of drawers. I want to be the kind of person that puts them in the drawer but I’m not, but I’m also not a person who can look at the wires being untidy on top of the chest of drawers and not be annoyed. It’s a first world problem to be sure. 

However, in a fit of annoyance caused by my not noticing that the cable had fallen on the floor and hoovering it up, I solved it with this.

Mine

A stand that charges both my phone and my watch and doesn’t make me wince every time I need to charge either device. It also charges airpods as well, but I don’t have any so I can’t answer to how well it does that!

It’s one of those very small things that make me a tiny bit more able to cope with the world.

And I bought one for my mum as well!

The one at mums

They are just very handy.

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Friday Links: I Just Can’t with the News Right Now

Posted on September 12, 2025 by nicdempsey

Happy Friday!

This is the worst personal news of my week. (it’s not but I’m British and I’m going to make a mountain out of this to avoid what’s actually happening!) Melvyn Bragg steps down from Radio 4’s In Our Time. I love In Our Time and it will not be the same without.

I saw a poor, lonely man wandering the A4 – then realised the sheer joy of where he was heading. I know that stretch of motorway and it’s grim, so is losing to Sunderland away!

‘Our hallway’s big enough to play football in!’ The council housing that feels like a holiday resort

The Baby Died. Whose fault is it? This is horrific.

It’s not about Rayner or Farage: the real tax story is how the super-rich avoid paying their share. I have a lot of thoughts about Angela Rayner and Peter Mandelson, as it goes. It’s about hubris. You are in public life, you have to be squeaky clean, you have to be seen to be squeaky clean, if it looks even slightly dodgy, if you have to explain yourself in a very complicated fashion, don’t do it. Don’t be arrogant. But yes also the issue is the super rich and their assumption they can do what they like, largely because they can buy politicians, and we’re back to needing people in public life to be squeaky clean

I’m exhausted but am surviving. How can I heal from burnout without expensive time off?. Oh this hit me where I live. I came across a phrase the other day that just sums up being single and childless. “Lots of people care about me but no-one cares for me”. For me, the non-negiotable is sleep, I go to bed at 10pm and I get up by 7am, I’ve been tired since Stef died but I work on having at least one night a week where the tracker logs 8 hours of sleep. Other things are doing the things that bring you joy, for me thats the plot. And I have planned little things that make me feel good, so from now until Christmas I am going to a couple of comedy gigs by myself because they start at 7pm and end by 9pm and I’m home in bed by about 10pm! And Christelle and I are going to Paris for the day. They are not massive holidays but they are holidays from everyday life!

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Allotment Adventures: Three and a Half Hours

Posted on September 10, 2025 by nicdempsey

I got four hours on the plot this weekend. About half an hour of that was spent chatting.

Time on the plot is going to be limited in the next while so I knew I wanted to tidy up the front and boy did I. I filled up an entire green waste bin with weeds and dead plants.

I’ve decided to just work up in strips. And see what I can get done.

I also picked tomatoes, lots of tomatoes

There are a couple of things left to do at the front.

The grass around the tree needs a deeper weed, and I’m going to move the cola plant back a bit so it’s on the edge of the path and then if it gets big it’s less of an issue. I also have some plants to put in there too!

I need to mulch the rhubarb with compost and I’m going to move the rhubarb that’s in the bucket into the ground.

I also need to cut back the jasmine and the cola plant and blackcurrant sage in the bed by the shed.

Then it’s the next strip back weed around the tomato beds and the paths there, sort out the tomatoes, sort out the fruit cage plants, set up the greenstalk and cut back the lavender there and weed the gooseberries.

That’s the plan for the next four hours! This weekend.

Im just going to work my way up the plot until it’s beautiful again!

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Monday Miscellany: Autumnal

Posted on September 8, 2025 by nicdempsey

Happy Monday!

  • Today is Nephew 2’s birthday, how quickly did that chubby, happy baby get to 10? The answer is very quickly!!
    • This week has felt very busy, I’ve been busy at work and adjusting to the new routine with Mum. I just need to get into harness and just used to the new routine but so far so good.
    • Last week was the first week of Autumn and boy did the weather suddenly become British again. It has rained quite a bit and it’s getting darker in the morning. I am not happy but I have set up the light lamp…
    • There seems to have been an uptick in the amount of scam texts and WhatsApps I’ve received this week. It’s annoying and I’m guessing it’s something to do with back to work/school after summer.  I just block them, but I have the sense that everyone is feeling quite fragile and vulnerable right now and this does not help!
    • Because it’s gotten all autumnal, I’ve made a batch of elderberry syrup and fire cider. This winter more than ever, I cannot be sick and I’m going to be very busy so on the basis that ‘every little helps’ time for some witchy remedies. Although actually elderberry syrup has some actual science behind it in helping get over lurgies, I take apple cider vinegar every day anyway so adding some other stuff to it for if I get lurgyfied is probably a good idea.
    • I’m going to Paris. Not immediately, but Christelle and I have been talking about it and there was a deal and so we’re going for a day in November. Yay!

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    Sunday Music: Buffalo Springfield – For What It’s Worth

    Posted on September 7, 2025 by nicdempsey

    I am the child of one wannabe hippy…(it was never my mother!) and at some point the old becomes relevant for the new and this just seems like a very apt song for the times…

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    Food Prep: Caring for Mum Edition

    Posted on September 4, 2025 by nicdempsey

    My mum has stopped being able to cook, it’s a combination of osteoarthritis in her hands and the increasing frailty, she currently has carers come in twice a day but they will only microwave meals. Ma’s preferred food solutions to her non cooking issues has been things that she can heat in her air fryer which we bought when we were worried about oven use. (It’s this one and it’s great.)

    Hot stew and brown rice

    My real difficult is that Ma has lost all appetite and hasn’t been eating, which can’t help, I spent last week making sure she ate and we came up with a menu plan of things she would eat that could be microwaved and I cooked and froze a bunch of them. We did have a bit of a fight about amounts of food and so we compromised, she eats 4 times a day but small portions.

    Dinners were: Lentil Bolognese and Pasta, Hot Stew and Rice, Pesto Pasta, Mint and Courgette Soup, Tomato and Feta Pasta, Cheesy Lentil Muffins.

    Lentil muffins

    Everything else can be eaten cold but is organised so the carers can help her find it.

    Breakfasts are easy because Ma has the same thing everyday anyway. Toast and jam at the weekends and yoghurt and fruit during the week. So I’ve portioned that up.

    Lunches are a cooked chicken thigh with tomatoes and cucumbers and there is an afternoon snack of a muffin and a banana.

    My current working plan is that I do the meal prep on Saturdays and cook one thing for the freezer so that we can rotate them in.

    Any suggestions of food that can be cooked ahead and frozen that aren’t pasta based can be microwaved and taste good would be appreciated!

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    Allotment Adventures: In which I take time off to sort out the plot and don’t

    Posted on September 3, 2025 by nicdempsey

    I really don’t want this space to be all about what is going on with my mum, although obviously, it is a huge thing in my life right now and potentially for a while to come. I have been saying that I have to have some kind of life outside of caring for Ma and work and usually the plot is part of that, but I’m struggling with it right now.

    My plan last week had been to take Friday to do my things, Saturday for Ma and then have three whole days to work on the plot and go back to work on Wednesday.

    None of that happened and by the weekend I was just too tired to do anything at the plot. Fortunately for me, so far this week it has rained…lots.

    For the rest of the month, I’m in adjust mode so it’ll be a Sunday thing and I’ll just do what I can. First up for this week is a tidy at the front and to plant up the green stalk I got for my birthday!

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    Monday Miscellany: Carers Edition

    Posted on September 1, 2025 by nicdempsey

    Happy Monday!

    1. I took an unexpected extra three days off work last week. Or at least the work that pays me. Ma had a series of falls over the weekend that she couldn’t get up from. I’ve spent every day at hers, or on a bus (except for Tuesday night when I had to come over in a cab and I stayed over Thursday and Friday night because of a bus strike). We have carers coming in twice a day at the minute and I went home on Saturday and was home on Sunday. I’m back to work today and I’m working on being less anxious, that will take some time but work.

    2. I don’t qualify for carers allowance because I earn too much but travel last week cost me over £100. This week there are bus and train strikes further complicating my life. I’ve said before that the problem with social care isn’t just the cost of it to the State, it’s the burden they put on people who do the right thing. I’m now one of those people.

    3. We have an OT and maybe physio visit on Wednesday and an appointment at the NHS Neurology appointment the week after so maybe things are moving. However, we have a possible diagnosis of small vessel disease and Progressive Supranuclear Palsy (PSP). Which to be frank, sucks all round.

    Meal prep for Mum

    4. When I worry, I can get completely overbearing. Right now, I’m really trying not to boss every inch of Mum’s existence because autonomy is important (that’s what she keeps telling me!) However, even though, I am worried and tired and really fucking scared for Mum, she is still one of my favourite people and stress aside, it’s been quite lovely to hang out with her this week.

    Watching The Thursday Murder Club on Friday night

    5. One of the things that happens when I’m very stressed or unhappy is that I don’t feel hungry. My work clothes are definitely feeling looser this week.

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