Weekly update – we’re moving – into a museum!

I have eluded to this before and some of our friends know a little more than others, so I though I’d bring things up to date in this weekly update.  So, we’re moving – into a museum!  Museum?  Not exactly but that’s what it feels like.

The story is that Rachel’s Mum has become very needy.  We figured she needed care 24 hours a day and we had a stark choice of buying live-in care, despatching her to a care home or moving in.  So that’s what we are in the process of doing – moving in.  We are organising increased care for her which also gives us a break and allows us to maintain some sanity for ourselves.

The tipping point was a week ago.  Just as we had returned from staying with her for a while, I returned a couple of hours later to give her lunch and found her collapsed on the floor.  I called an ambulance and they checked her over and again, because of COVID-19, we agreed it was best to keep her at home instead of the usual hospital stay.  Since then she has been very wobbly – physically and mentally – but we have seen signs of improvement.

We have entertained a number of visitors – carer agencies, occupational therapy nurse, a social worker, a doctor, a phlebotomist, all with their PPE equipment making me wonder what kind of world it is out there these days.  Soon we will be having additional grab rails and other adaptations.  All good stuff and we think things are beginning to fall into place.

Rachel’s Mum effectively has a very large bedsitting room downstairs and she is self contained.  We will occupy the rest of the house with its three staircases, a cellar, two garages, lots of dust and cobwebs.  We are determined to transform our rooms from the museum pieces to stylish, comfortable rooms but not ostentatious in any way.  We are fortunate as the house is actually two houses joined together.  The oldest part is just under 300 years old.  The newest part is Victorian.  Therefore we have a mixture of cottage style rooms, with low ceilings and oak beams and alongside this are a couple of higher ceiling, large window period rooms.

Our first task is to create a downstairs sitting room, so we can be within earshot.  I have removed some big heavy furniture which we all loathe and will try and sell.  Other furniture has made it to an attic room and other things are dotted around the house.  The walls and ceiling have been cleaned, ready for papering, painting etc.  We are going for some contemporary colour schemes and hopefully blending old things with some more striking modern things.  If we get it right, it will be very nice.

It doesn’t feel as if we are at home yet.  We have few possessions here, no wi-fi, the hob and oven don’t work but we have an early 1980s microwave and a talking microwave (adapted for the blind).  We have to clear so much bric-a-brac while not unsettling Rachel’s Mum.  This is strange for us both and this was brought home to me when I returned to our house to collect a few more things.  It felt as if I didn’t quite live in our house anymore, we are in a kind of limbo.  This tugs at our emotions a great deal; we hadn’t planned to move out of our house like this, although I guess we both knew it could happen one day.  In fact we were about to have a new carpet fitted at home and we were looking to replace two radiators.  Now all that is on hold.

Other things

I have been retired for two years now!  It has been such a happy time for me, even though we haven’t travelled much.  We haven’t been abroad as we had hoped, pretty much family ties have steered us to stay at home more.  The right time will come.

Now I’m settled into retirement now, I sometimes miss work.  I don’t miss the blummin Council but I do miss the world of Probation, Justice and the fabulous colleagues I had there.  I want to write far more on my reflections about being retired and remembering work; there is much to say.

Running – I have a couple of runs each week these days.  I have injured both of my heels somehow, the left more so.  Quite painful and stiff when I get up in the morning.  Going a few days without running seems best and I average over 10,000 steps a day.

Blogging is still nice.  It is nice to look back on things and although I don’t talk about everything, or am cryptic, I know what I mean.  It’s also nice when people make comments or get in touch privately.  Here’s a few other blogging points

• Sometimes when I write, I write as if I am talking to a specific person.  If you know me personally, it could be you I have in mind
• Friday always seems to be a slow day with fewer page views compared to other days
• There is a nice upward page view trend
• I get irritated when people ask if they can submit a blog post, I write back and then hear nothing
• My old post on Exercising with a Catheter is consistently a top post, followed by me generally talking about money, investments and trying to live a frugal life
• I get a lot of Google searches bringing traffic and also a fair amount through Twitter.  The more I tweet, the more traffic