Grumpy Travelling

We had to travel from Skegness to Southwell and back on Tuesday for my job, I say we because I can't drive - this will be moaned about further in another blog - so my chauffeur took me.

This is partly the story of how a mild-mannered, generally sweet tempered man turns into a swearing, hand gesturing monster as soon as he gets behind the steering wheel. The rest of it is how bloody annoying I find most other road users.

On our way I counted 7 drivers using their mobile phone, the worst by far was a huge articulated lorry with left-hand drive, don't these foreign drivers cause enough carnage on our roads with their blind-spots without compounding their difficulties by being distracted by a phone?
Isn't it a pity we can't report them, I'd enjoy travelling much more if I could sit with pen and paper writing down the registration numbers of all the drivers that annoy me [I'd need a really big notebook].

My chauffeur obeys all the speed limits, this is very frustrating as well as positively dangerous as some t**t invariably wants to go faster, so is either - as my aforementioned sweet tempered man puts it - "up our a**e" or they overtake us, not always when it's safe to do so. This is when the swearing and hand gestures begin. The trouble is, I've started joining in and it's not very seemly for a lady of my quite advanced years. Hmm, you should hear us when we're on a 'Crumbly Day Out' with our friends. Another blog in the making I think.

Do women that have recently given birth also have a 'brain-bypass'??
An unbelievable number of young, obviously caring and doting mothers seem to think that they and their offspring are invincible. Why do they park their cars then proceed to get baby out of the back seat on the road-side instead of pavement???
They don't even look if anything is coming, just open the door, reach in for baby and assume you must have seen them so you'll either stop or go around them to hit an oncoming car. They are oblivious to their surroundings! [oh heck, this sentence sounds familiar]. Fortunately for these young women, they tend to be in towns or villages so [theoretically] passing cars should be going slow.

Anyway we arrived at Southwell, did what I had to do then decided to see the sights ...

Three minutes later we had a cup of tea having seen all of Southwell apart from the Minster and Workhouse.


I took a couple of photo's of the Minster then went in, it's well worth a visit. We've passed many a time and threatened to visit but not done so before, I'm glad we finally did and hope to go again. Next time we go to Southwell we plan to visit the Workhouse.

On our way back to Skegness, the air was still blue and the hand gestures continued as before.
At one point as we were turning right my window was wound down with the chauffeurs button and he bellowed in my ear "tell him to p**s off". This was to someone going straight on who moments before had 'been up our a**e'. I think my eardrum was possibly perforated.

A bit further on it was lovely and peaceful, no cars, just the open road and fields on either side when I noticed out of the corner of my eye, yet another hand gesture.
"What?" I said.
"What?" he replied.
This 'what' conversation went on a little while longer, just until I could see that I'd have to crack first.

"What was that last gesture for? There's no-one else about" I asked.

"I was just waving to a scarecrow" ...

Fishy Problems

We went to Shipley Garden Centre for my fishy bits, I got a pump and filter for my small tank + a proper breeding net doo dah that stays in the main tank, I say proper because I'd always used makeshift but very successful contraptions with my goldfish [who have got rather large and so are now living in a pond].
I thought I'd give the breeding net a go first, I put them all in and lobbed the overfed snail back in the main tank.

As a result I spent almost the entire day [I was meant to be working] fishing babies out of the tank and putting them in the net, I was up to about 30 fish but I still couldn't see many in the breeding net, I had suspected earlier that they were going straight through it but thought [hoped] it was too fine a mesh, I was wrong.
As quick as I was putting them in, they were making their escape, stupid bloody fish!
At 11.30 last night I decided to set up the other tank and transferred the babies into that, there were 6 survivors and I've caught 3 more this morning.

Not to mention that if I were a cat I'd probably used up at least two of my remaining nine lives in the last three days.
The tank is incorporated into the bottom of a coffee table and to get to the fish I had to take the glass top off, so this meant I had to balance the lamp on the edge of the table to see what I was doing.



Yes - it was stupid, after five minutes the lamp did a nose dive into the tank and I caught it just as the bulb hit the water and went pop. 'Oh s**t' was my first thought, 'have I killed all the tank inhabitants?' Meanwhile my other half was telling me off about water and electricity not mixing, blah blah blah.

All the fish were OK, the bulb was changed by the aforementioned muttering electrician, it didn't even blow the fuse but now I had to fish out the glass from the bottom of the tank and skim off the powdered stuff from the top. Why do I get into these scrapes?

Later on, I was holding firmly onto the lamp - haven't let go of it since whilst searching for babies, when I dropped my high-tech fishing instrument on the floor, OK, it's a jug. I leaned down to pick it up without thinking and found myself being told off again as the lamp was about a centimetre away from being dipped into the tank with yours truly holding on to it for grim death so that it didn't fall in.

That was when I decided to move them into the other tank, not for their safety, but for the peace of mind of my grumpy old man. I agree though, I should have known better.



Oh yes, during the transfer between tanks I tried to slice my toes off - no shoes or slippers on as usual - on the glass table top as it was leaning against the sofa and I walked straight into the edge of it. This is a problem of mine, although I can and do regularly multi-task with the best of the female species, if I'm on a mission I've got a one-track mind and I'm totally oblivious to everything else, surroundings, safety etc. I did, more than once step back off a stepladder whilst up it painting fish [I like fish] on the spare bedroom walls, fortunately I wasn't too high at the time.

After all this I had a whisky to calm his nerves, he doesn't really drink but I'm more than happy to stand in ...

I'm a fishy Grandma!

My 'golden' White Cloud Mountain minnows have had babies, I've found about 14 so far and have moved them into a large goldfish bowl with one of my apple snails happily munching on his lettuce and cucumber.
This, I'm lead to believe helps feed the young fry as the apple snail excretes the micro-organisms [infusoria] they feed on.
It's only a temporary measure and I'm going to buy better equipment and food for them tomorrow otherwise the water will soon get polluted and my apple snail will escape, I'd hate to walk into the living room and something go crunch.
The adult fish are starting to look a bit frisky again and one of the females looks quite chunky so there maybe more to follow, this will keep me busy and amused for hours, so much so that I'll probably forget to be grumpy...

Unpacking And Yet More Moaning

We were going to the 'manor' today but now I've got some work to do, it's very secret, hush hush work [yeh, right], but they want it back as soon as possible so it's pointless going away yet.

Therefore instead of chasing around after the grumpy old man asking him to get out the clothes he wants packing, I've now unpacked my things. Hopefully by the time we do go I'll be able to leave out some of my more wintery garb. It also saves me lying in wait for an unsuspecting cat who isn't so unsuspecting after all and seems to have disappeared - how does she know?

By staying at home a bit longer I'll be able to get back into serious 'grump' mode, I've been too cheerful the last couple of days and it really doesn't suit me although I haven't had the headache or face-ache caused by practising my frown.

I'm taking my grumpy old man to B & Q tomorrow [10% discount for crumblies] to get some paint to finish off the bathroom that we've been putting off for ages. Well it was no good doing much in the way of improvement if one of the Asda rumours were true, the one that they were demolishing our houses, I liked that rumour, it was my very, very favourite.

Now, whilst I would like an Asda in Langley Mill, the more I read the booklet, the less I think we actually need one. Yes, it reads like they are doing us a great favour, saying that most people in Langley Mill go to either Morrisons at Eastwood or Tesco at Heanor.
Gosh, you may think, they must be miles away, this is not so, they are both very close towns with an exceptional bus service to either.

I imagine the traffic to and from Langley Mill will increase and it's bad enough now with through traffic, we know what a complete bog they made at Heanor with Tesco's island, can Langley Mill cope with this?
Langley Mill is only small, not even a town really, but it's got a Netto, Farmfoods and Lidl already, plenty for the size of the place. The only good I think they'll be doing is employing local people but is this enough?

Something does want doing with that eyesore on the corner of Cromford road, it looks dreadful as a first impression upon entering Amber Valley , if I was arriving at Langley Mill for the first time I'd be inclined to leave as fast as possible.

Oh, and where do they get the idea that Heanor Haulage is on Cromford road? We all know it's on Wesley Street, just off of Station Road - or are there other plans that we don't know about?

The cat has just turned up, huh, that's what I call 'sods law'

Oh yes, I'm back on 'Grumpy' form ...

Mystery of the socks - case solved!

This is not about my odd socks, they're gradually turning up as I dig deeper into the linen basket, no this is another sock puzzle.
Now to me, socks are the peasant equivalent to women who buy handbags or shoes, I love socks - and can afford them - but they seem to have disappeared.

When we first went to the 'Manor' this year I didn't pack many [well there weren't many actual pairs] as I thought I must have left some there when we closed for the winter.
I was wrong, oh dear, this meant that I had to buy some more [tragic].

I've been packing this morning ready to go again and I was still puzzled about my complete lack of socks, I needed some plain white or trainer socks in case we went bird watching and it was warm enough for cropped jeans - it's that time of year when you have to pack for every type of weather. I'd look a complete numpty in cropped jeans with bright orange Garfield socks.

I checked in the Christmas underwear draw [I have a reminder on my phone to get in the festive mood and start wearing my Christmas socks on Nov 14th]
I searched in all the suspect places and believe me when you've got to bring all your stuff back from the caravan for the winter, you shove them anywhere they'll fit.

Of course, that's what I'd done, only I'd forgotten all about it. When I bought them back last winter I got as many in my sock draw as would fit and stashed the rest. Eventually I found them - in the cat's 'rainy day' draw, about 50 pairs in 2 carrier bags.

This year I must make a note to myself informing me what I've done with things, I recently found a lot of sheets in the attic in a plastic underbed container we bought back with us. I know they've been up there at least two years because that's when I lost them and bought more sheets.

There was a time when I remembered every detail and didn't have to write reminders, this is a sure sign that my brain cells are dying at an alarming rate - or my preferred theory, that my head is so full of stuff that it's overflowing...

Been to see Asda's plans again

I've been to have a look at Asda's plans for Langley Mill again with my friends [I'm like that, nosy as well as grumpy]. I posted my views on their proposals in the box whilst I was there rather than emailing them.

It was actually better at the Bridge centre today as you could see everything and talk to someone from Asda quite easily, even [almost] being offered a pencil so I could draw in some trees on one of the plans. When we went on Wednesday it was overcrowded with practically the entire population of two streets turning up at the same time, this was no-ones fault as we all had a right to be there first.

I can't help being a bit suspicious about the houses Asda and HH propose to build behind us. I think they're included on the plans simply to put me off the scent [conspiracy theories, self importance and paranoia - just look at the problems I have with missing socks and it's up to 10 odd ones now!].

I bet when it's all done and dusted HH will still be on the back of us just as Mr HH said they may.

I don't think there's the room [even downsized] for HH's complete operation to go next to the Asda store; offices yes, they'll probably go there + indoor storage, but all the lorry fronts, flat-bed trailers, moving equipment and general crap will have to fit in somewhere. As I see it there's only the back of us and there's nothing we can do about it as they're already there.
Lets hope I'm wrong to be suspicious, I have been known to be wrong before [I can't remember the exact date]

I wonder if anyone else noticed the new Asda addition in the booklet? [also on the website] It's the page with the little map of nearby Asda's. Well number 2 is at Hucknall and to my knowledge Hucknall hasn't got an Asda... Yet.

I did mention it to one of the Asda people there [I'm like that] and I got the impression that they'd rather someone like me - a woman on a mission to annoy people with her BLOG - hadn't noticed.

I think I'll have a change from being grumpy now, I'm getting on my own nerves & it's giving me a headache having to wear a permanent frown...

A bad Week

Well I'm having a titifilarious time I must say, first my dog died [I don't think that has sunk in yet], then we find out that Heanor Haulage are definitely staying, but across the road and not behind us. Today we went to Rufford Park for my fourth hobby which in order of favourites is
1. moaning, 2. computers, 3. card making, 4. photography. 5. star gazing


I took a couple of photo's of fungi, mainly because it's easy to get them to pose - have you ever tried talking a bee into holding still?
Then I saw it, no not the Treecreeper that I'd been after for the last few weeks, but the bloody red [empty] battery icon flashing, I blame the bee that wouldn't hold still for a photograph when we went for a walk by the canal the other day, nothing to do with the fact that I'd forgotten to recharge the camera.

I'll be sending my opinions on 'Asda in Langley Mill' by email but that's only because there's not enough room on the card for me to write everything I think I need to say, it won't be nasty or demanding or unreasonable and I promise not to lie naked in front of the bulldozers when I don't get my own way, unless it's summer of course [and believe me you want to hope it's winter 'cos it's not pretty].

On an entirely different subject - I have here before me 9 odd socks - all mine - how has this happened?

1 Tweety pie
1 bear
1 pig
1 Cheeky chops [don't ask]
3 different Garfields
1 other ginger cat [I've got a matching keyring to this pair]
1 nutty tart ... yes well ...

Asda's plans for Langley Mill

Well FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFlippin Heck, Mr Heanor Haulage was fibbing when he said they 'may move to their back yard'. They're going to annoy us on the front instead, I can't see where Mr HH is going to fit in all his crap, although we were told he was downsizing.

We ahem, can give our opinions to Asda but I can't see that making any difference whatsoever, but we will try!

Not only will will HH be on the front, the same area will be for Asda's deliveries and we weren't told that it wasn't going to be 24 hour opening, in fact it was very much suggested that it would be.

Oh I can feel a major grump coming on...