The evening before yesterday i.e. the evening of Christmas Day itself, turned out to be quite eventful. My Droitwich friend had an arrangement to have Christmas lunch with one of her best friends but, in the event, this had turned out to be quite a large party by the time families and friends had intermingled. We had an arrangement that I would pick my friend up from her friend’s house so that the party could proceed apace without fear of any subsequent motoring being involved. Now my SatNav gave me the road but not the number of the house and given that the road is an extraordinarily long one with numbers proceeding I the hundreds I suspected that I might have quite a lot of hunting around to do in the dark to find the correct house. So when the SatNav announced ‘You have arrived at your destination’ I knew that this was probably only an approximation to the truth. So I pulled in at the first block of houses that I saw which formed a little cul-de-sac off the main road and, tentatively, approached the very first house to discern its number so that I could navigate from there. Imagine my amazement when I discovered that this house was the very one for which I was looking – how amazing is that! So my friend stayed with me overnight in one of our spare bedrooms and we are planning a really lazy day crashing out together. We know that the meal is already sort of prepared from the leftovers from yesterday that we can turn into a really delicious stew so that is the midday meal sorted out and we will probably both take a turn in the park to clear our heads and to fall in with Boxing day traditions. Needless to say, I have not really studied the TV offerings today but I do notice from a cursory glance that Paddington 2 is to be broadcast in the ate afternoon so this may be a treat in store. An extraordinary musical incident happened to me this morning. In the kitchen, I asked my smart speaker to play first Bach’s Christmas Oratorio and then Handel’s Messiah. In the latter they were playing ‘For unto us a son is born’ which has proved to be rather emotive in this year of Meg’s passing for both theological and personal reasons. Then I left the kitchen and entered my main lounge where I get things going, one of them being putting on ClassicFM where they were playing – ‘For not us a son is born’ My brain initially tried to sort how the track from the smart speaker could possibly have transferred over to the ClassicFM broadcast at the other end of the house until I realised that this was a complete coincidence (although I think I have experienced something akin to this once before). Having got through Christmas Day and arrived at Boxing Day, I think that several quite relaxing days lie ahead and, in some ways, this is the most enjoyable part of the whole Christmas experience. The weather is particularly cold and bitter this morning so we are having to think carefully about what to wear before we brave the winter cold for a walk in our local park.
Today is meant to be a lazy day of relaxation and so it has turned out to be. In the middle of the day, I turned out to get a copy of my daily newspaper and was pleasantly surprised to find that my local ‘Asda‘ was open. This proved to be fortuitous because I managed to not only obtain a copy of my daily newspaper but also to purchase two or three items of stationery (including one of those narrow ‘strip’ style of calendars that I use in one or two places around the house) When I got back home, I started to pay attention to the lunch that we were going to have, I started off by frying an onion and then gently frying it before adding the remains of yesterday’s leftovers. I removed the meat from the remaining portion of lamb and then prepared some carrots and petit pois to provide a more balanced stew. My Droitwich friend provided some finishing touches and we then ate the resulting stew with some slices of freshly cut sourdough bread which we at well buttered.The whole was delicious and we still have a little left over for a future occasion.Then I needed to do a quick replacement of the bulbs in our electric fire which always seem to blow at the slightest provocation such as flicking on the on-off switch too rapidly (I suspect it is a design fault because I keep on having to do this about twice a year) The news takes on a back seat whilst the population as a whole is relaxing and probably getting ready for several days of respite from the Christmas onslaught. On ClassicFM they are playing the theme from ‘Doctor Zhivago’ (Laras’s theme) and this was the film that Meg and I regarded as ‘our film’ and we first saw it in Leicester Square in the mid 1960’s. Although I have watched the film on several occasions and it is re-broadcast fairly frequently, nonetheless I suspect it would be rather too painful for me to view it again in the near future as it would bring back too many painful memories. I always used to use these few days to transfer addresses from last year’s diaries to this years but this habit has fallen into disuse as I no longer need to use a diary in the traditional way. What is perhaps much more important is a large planning whiteboard that I have in our kitchen and upon which you can detail seven weeks of activities at a time. Every so often, it has to be wiped clean and repopulated with dates and one just have to be careful only to use the dry erasable and not the permanent marker pens. But today I was fortunate in obtaining a supply of dry marker pens because even WH Smiths (as was) does not always stock them and, if it does, at an inflated price. The board really came into its own when my son and daughter-in-law were living in the same house as Meg and I so that we could all, a glance, be informed of each other’s movements for the days and weeks ahead. Even though I am the sole occupant of the house, though, it is still incredibly useful to see commitments for weeks ahead.