End of May feelings in the form of a poem

I’m feeling strangely inept.
Tired voices tell me the job I discarded
Should have been kept.
I almost wept.

A simple, daily task.
Floored by inexperience, panic veiled
by a confident mask.
I couldn’t ask.

Now I sit distraught.
Regretting not approaching boss for lesson
He would happily have taught.
I have learnt naught.

RC 31-5-21

Just before midnight

What a glorious day of glorious gloriousness today has been. A whole day with sister Sophie, for the first time in what feels like forever. Mathew was on great form and fell increasingly in love with her as the day progressed. The weather was an absolute Godsend and my old enemy Time seemed to play along with the spirit of the day and drags its heels on the ground and pass slowly. I barbecued without burning, I drank without getting drunk and I carried out conversations without muttering about myself. It is late in the day and I feel refreshed, touched by the Sun and thoroughly, totally, stupefyingly content.

RC 30-5-21

Spank Holiday Weekend

I’d forgotten May is a two-Bank month, so I’m facing another full-on three-day Workfest involving visiting hordes of tourists and a multitude of early-season maintenance problems. Or maybe I’m projecting negatively and it’ll be a pain-free, easy-going Extended Weekend of Fun with grateful holidaymakers and zero hassle. Who knows?
At least the weather should be finally improving. 20 degrees Celsius by Sunday, which should be the least we expect at this time of year, but will feel almost Mediterranean after the long slog of Wintry shite we’ve been existing in for the past month or so.  
I am, of course, neglecting to talk about the BIG item on the agenda for the next few days, which is the imminent arrival of my sister. When I return from the caravan site tomorrow (which could be anytime from 6 to 11pm, depending on how things go) Sophie should be settled in nicely at our house and will be staying there until late on Monday. It’s a pain that I’m out for two of the three days, but she can have some quality Auntie/Nephew time with Mathew, and we’ll have all day Sunday for a good catch-up and chinwag.
She should arrive about 10am tomorrow, so I imagine she and Philippa will be on Bottle Of Wine Number Three long before I walk in the door.

RC 28-5-21

Shouldering the burden

This shoulder thing is getting on my nerves now. It’s not bad enough to warrant a trip to the doctor, but it’s bad enough to be an inconvenience. It’s not painful enough to warrant strong painkillers, but it’s painful enough to make paracetamol ineffective and pointless. I’ve tried a hot water bottle, a bag of frozen peas, and a one-on/one-off combination of both, but nothing seems to alleviate it. I’ve tried various stretches and movements suggested online without any respite whatsoever and resting it as much as possible for the last week or seems to have made little difference.
I’m not sure what to do now.
Everyone I speak to has an opinion, but their ideas are based on their own experiences, so the lady in the office with a problematic disc will give me different advice from the maintenance man who has a damaged tendon. Until I know exactly what the issue is, it seems, it’ll be difficult to know how to treat it. Which is why we have GPs, I suppose, but I don’t want to bother our over-worked health service with an insignificant niggle that will hopefully right itself over the course of time.
So I shall valiantly battle on, and if it’s still giving me gyp after the weekend I’ll see if I can find a decent chiropractor. And by ‘decent’ I mean ‘cheap’.

RC 27-5-21

Not my bag, baby...

I’m not entirely sure my words will do credit to just how awful that Turmeric Tea was. Imagine making a pot of really strong tea, then leaving it to fester for an afternoon, then heating it up again in the microwave. Now imagine that, while said pot of tea was festerating, you cooked up some olive oil and lemon juice in a frying pan, to which you added huge amounts of powdered turmeric, which you then burnt to the bottom of the pan. Now imagine mixing all that lot together in a mug and that pretty much sums up what I just drank.
In a word - Bleurgh!!

RC 26-5-21
1420 BST

Better Bag?

I’m trying something today called “Taka Turmeric Masala Chai Tea.”
It could be a revelation, or it could be a puke-inducing mixture of trendy ingredients that will make me feel like a woke millennial has spit in my mouth.
I’ll give you an update shortly…..

RC 26-5-21

An Open Letter to Channel 4

Dear C4 people,

 

You advertise yourselves as ‘The UK’s Biggest Free Streaming Service’ and there are, undoubtedly, lots of things to access via your website. Not all of it worth watching, it has to be said. (The phrase ‘quantity over quality’ has never seemed more apt.)

Despite this multitude of available programming, I am afraid I shall have to stop watching your products on my laptop, as a repeat problem keeps occurring that I can no longer accept as just ‘one of those things.’

To whit – any time I watch an old episode of an old programme of yours, the stream will be interrupted and the link will be lost and the content will crash, always with some space of time between 2 minutes and 90 seconds left to view. Binge-watching ‘Shameless’ and it’s Goodbye to the Gallaghers prematurely. Giving ‘The West Wing’ a well-deserved repeat airing, and the same thing happens. I never get to the end of an episode, so it’s pointless trying to follow the series.

Funnily enough, it NEVER happens during the ad breaks, which seem to be longer and more frequent than they were when the programmes originally aired.
I would contact you directly about this, but I doubt you care.
I’m not accusing you of doing this deliberately, but as I said – it’s funny how it never happens when the ads are playing…

Yours,
Disgruntled Viewer of Suffolk.

RC 25-5-21

The Return of The Runaway Rory

When was the last time I left more than a week between blog postings?
I’d like to say this latest gap has been because I’ve been abroad somewhere, sunning myself in a get-tanned sty-lee, but No. I’ve just been exceptionally busy at work, worn out by a rather over-active and under-sleeping 2-year-old, and suffering with ongoing niggly shoulder pain that is making me want to punch myself in the deltoid or amputate my own arm.

I’ve already met some interesting holidaymakers, especially the Northern gentleman who kicked up a fuss on Saturday because he had to ‘wait frigging hours to pick my key up’. We’re strictly enforcing the ‘two people at a time’ rule at the main desk and we’re asking them to maintain social distance while queueing. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t be allowed to stay open. Most people are completely understanding and just happy to be here, but he seemed determined to abandon the holiday mood and spend his first day in Suffolk moaning at everyone, about everything. Maybe he’s just one of those people who have to find a fault with everything they encounter, or they’re not happy. If so, I wonder how he’s coped with being stuck at home during lockdown? He probably moaned at his wife all day about the way she’d prepared his bacon.
I’m sure he won’t be the last dick I have to deal with, and I think I handled him quite well, so that bodes well for the rest of the year….

RC 24-5-21

Sneaky and Creaky

I suppose it’s time for my traditional, monthly, middle-of-the-month “Oh, my God! Why is Time passing so quickly? How are we halfway through the month already? Woe is me! I’ll be dead soon! etc etc blah blah blah” blog, but I don’t feel like doing that today.

Philippa pulled a crafty move earlier this evening in the old ‘Will We/Won’t We; Should We/Shouldn’t We Have Another Child’ game. She was playing on the floor with Mathew and getting him to say “Yes!” to various questions and kept praising and applauding him when he did it. Then after asking things like “Do we like Lego?” – “Yes!” – and “Is Mathew lovely?” – “Yes!” – she threw in “Would Mathew like a little brother or sister to play with?” to which he obviously and automatically said “Yes!” promptly receiving wild hugs and applause from his sneaky bitch of a mother.  I kept my eyes firmly rooted to the television and refused to react or engage.

My shoulder has started making unusual noises. I think it might be an effect of hoisting Mathew up onto it quite frequently and carrying him around like I’m Quasimodo and he’s my hump. I’ve been doing it for months now, but he’s getting heavier every day so I think it may be starting to affect my body, my balance and my posture. I would call the doctor, but I suspect I’ll just be told to take ibuprofen and ice it. I also think they’ll ask me what I’ve done to upset it and once I tell them they’ll say “Stop doing that.” So I’ll save them the trouble, and save myself the phone call, and just prescribe myself rest and painkillers. Or alcohol, whichever I get to first.

RC 16-5-21

I have, today, surprised myself

Today has been delightful. All around me, people were panicking about a new Covid variant, but I remained steadfastly optimistic. The British climate attempted to assault my enthusiasm with yet another day of grey skies and consistent drizzle, but I defiantly smiled and got on with my day and enjoyed it. We had a nice walk (with Mathew sitting very comfortably in his buggy beneath a plastic rain shield) and got a nice takeaway sausage baguette – resplendently adorned with brown sauce – and a hot cuppa. It’s ridiculous that we had to wear Winter coats in mid-May, but I surprisingly refused to allow that to affect our day.
Now we are about to enjoy a bottle of wine and a movie. And I have let Philippa choose the film and have not raised one iota of annoyance at her decision.
Weird.

RC 15-5-21

Insufficient somnulence

I slept like absolute shit last night.
It wasn’t like a return of insomnia, it was different. My mind was hopping about all over the place and kept finding things that seemed incredibly important and that needed my undivided mental attention immediately. So I’d work on it for a while, then I’d drift off into a weird state of sort-of sleep, then I’d crash back into reality with another list of urgent tasks that my mind convinced me simply couldn’t wait til morning.
I’m thinking it may have been over-excitement about the Imminent Chesworth Family Reunion, as I was certainly bouncing around the house like a child on Christmas Eve after having a chat with Sophie. Whatever caused it, it was unpleasant and I am suffering for it today. Sluggish, sloppy, slow and wayward are just two of the words I could use to describe myself and my performance thus far on this Friday.
I’ve tried drinking lots of tea. I’ve tried eating lots of fruit. I’ve tried ‘resting my eyes’ for 10 minutes in a meditative way, but nothing seems to be working. I guess I’ll just have to plough on through it and hope for a better bedtime tonight.

RC 14-5-21

Plans, plans, plans

Sophie is coming to stay for the end of May bank holiday weekend!
I am so excited I could fill my blog with capital letters and exclamation marks BUT I WON’T!!!
I suggested different things we could do and different places we could visit, but she said, “No – I just want to chill at the house and spend time with my brother and nephew.” Sounds good to me.
I’ll have a chat with Hannah later and see if she and Nathan can pop over on the Saturday evening. I can throw a barbecue together and get some wine chilled and we can all have a proper family chat and catch-up in the garden.
EXCITING!!!

RC 13-5-21

Stinky Stanzas

Inspired by my own terrible wordsmithery yesterday, I’m tempted to launch an online Anti-Poetry Competition to find the worst verses ever written by Mankind.
I can’t decide whether to make it a genuine attempt to find genuinely awful poems that were written with serious intent, or whether to invite deliberate, original attempts at coming up with some truly horrendous rhymes and see what pours forth. Either way, I’m sure that between us we could uncover some pretty awful abuses of the English language.
I’ve had a little scan about the internet, and there are countless competitions for wannabe Wordworths and Tennyson types to send in their stuff in the hope of being discovered, but there are no real opportunities for the awful amateurs among us to share our wares and celebrate the bottom of the barrel!
I want to change that!
I have a meeting with my boss tomorrow – I might see if he fancies sponsoring this and helping to get it established….

RC 12-5-21

Crap poem written on a break

May disappearing at a rate of knots.
Already, my mind is flitting towards Winter.
Hay fever medication flying off the shelves.
At least I’m not re-stocking them anymore.

A holiday centre is an Island of Fun.
A destination dipped in Destiny.
Drive up, roll up, collect one’s keys.
Forget daily life and its work worries.

Lockdown paunches adorn every belly.
Aeroplanes still sit, unfilled.
Twitchers await the swallow’s return.
And the calming call of the cuckoo.

Is anything better than lunch outside?
With the warmth of the Sun on one’s skin?
Enjoying the birdsong; the daffodils sway.
Lunch is over – it’s time to head in.

RC 11-5-21

Up and A-May

I’ve decided that today’s blog will be a positive one, and a long one, as my previous efforts so far this month have been the exact opposites of that.  

The weather – finally – has taken a turn for the drier and warmer, and for the first time in ages it feels like Spring in Suffolk!

We had a picnic-style tea sitting in the garden and everyone enjoyed it immensely, especially me. Then we came in to catch up on the news that from next Monday, as planned, more restrictions will be lifted and households can be mixed more, so we can go inside at Ted and Beryl’s and have Sister Sophie over to stay the night! This is all, if you can forgive me sounding like a teenager for a moment, ‘well awesome’.  We have a little boy who has spent very little time with his extended family and our circle of friends. Ted and Beryl had to shield and Sophie runs a care home, so her life has been utter bilgewater for nearly all of the past year, and even when we were between lockdowns (but still sans vaccines) it was tricky spending time with her.

From next Monday, though, she can plan to travel to see us and stay for a whole weekend! The sooner this can happen, the better.

In fact, I’m going to step aside from this blog post for a few minutes so I can give her a call and book some dates in.

 

She’s at work and unable to take personal calls. Bugger.

 

Anyway – it’ll happen. And it’ll happen soon. And we can have Nathan and Hannah over and cook them a meal inside. And we can invite some of our neighbours round for drinks, and have barbecues for a dozen people, and Philippa can start playing badminton again, and I could sit in the bar and have a drink at the sports club while she plays (if I wanted to, which I won’t, but it’s nice to know I could) and she can start visiting her many relatives that she hasn’t been able to see for months, and I can enjoy the peace and quiet of the house (and fill it with drumming) while she’s gone, and several other multitude of things that I never realised were fun and necessary until it became impossible to do them for a while.

We have blackbirds singing in the garden, a gorgeous field of oilseed rape swaying hypnotically in the field nearby, less and less people ill and more and more people protected, the ability to travel abroad, a chance to have a nice meal indoors cooked by a professional chef, etc, etc, etc

Is that long enough and positive enough yet?

Yeah – I think so. Time to sit in the garden again with a cup of lapsang souchong, watching the embers of the sunset.

RC 10-5-21

Unpleasant topic

It’s not a very nice thing to mention, but I’ve always tried to base this blog in the reality of my life, and the reality at the moment is that I’m constipated.
I thought this only happened to pregnant women and old people.
I don’t know if it’s the change in eating habits brought about by a new job routine, or if it’s down to the stressy aspects of learning that new job, or just an age thing, but it’s happening, it’s real and it’s uncomfortable.
I may have gone a bit over-the-top with my homespun remedy for relief, as I had a big bowl of Shreddies for breakfast, a big bowl of vegetable soup for lunch and a tin of prunes for dessert after tea tonight. I’ve also drunk about 12 litres of water today. If that lot doesn’t shift something I’ll give up and call the doctor.

RC 5-5-21

Snooker Soundbite

QUOTE OF THE DAY: (from Ted)

“Mark Selby is the Anti-Christ of Snooker. He’s destroying it. He turns an exciting, skilful game into a tiresome slog through boredom. Watching him play is like watching Beryl knit a pair of socks, but without the nice end product. I’d love to go and watch the World Championships live next year, but if Selby was playing I would storm the table and ram a broken cue up his pim-hole”.

RC 4-5-21

Must try harder

A Bank Holiday working. Why is it that whatever industry I find myself drawn to, it invariably requires me to work on days when others are relaxing at home?
I’m not moaning, honestly. I know it sounds like I am, and I know I’ve been in a moany kind of mind recently, but I assure you I’m okay. I just seem to have dropped into the habit of airing every single little annoyance I have while blogging. A day can go by that fills me with joy and leaves me beaming, but as soon as I sit down and start typing my mind concentrates on a tiny little grievance (probably related to the weather!)
It’s something I’m aware of, and something I want to try very hard to eradicate, but at the same time I have to say it’s a very easy trap to fall into. I guess its just the Modern World of which I am reluctantly a part. Any social media platform is full of people moaning, normally people who have nothing to moan about, and I guess that negativity is catching. It’s certainly, it appears, much, much easier to find something to moan about than to it is to always be positive.
And I’m as guilty of that as anyone at the moment.

RC 3-5-21

Tired Topic

Another day off, another conversation with my wife about the possibility of her becoming pregnant again. She’s becoming obsessed (again). Admittedly, she has some good reasons:

1.    If they’re close together in age, they’ll get on well and play nicely together.

2.    Philippa would like to get childbirth over and done with, so she can concentrate on a career.

3.    We might as well have another one while we’re locked in parent mode, and have recent experience of dealing with a baby.

4.    Every ‘only child’ we know has grown up to be a weirdo.

But still – it’s not a pressing matter for me, and not something I want to be going over and over every weekend when I should really be relaxing after a hard week of trying to get my head around a new job.
Maybe that’s her strategy – beat me into submission with constant barracking, so that eventually I cave in and impregnate her just to get a break from the incessant onslaught of pressure. Sneaky cow. I’ll have to develop a counter-strategy. I might wear a condom permanently just to make sure nothing happens when I’m distracted.

RC 2-5-21

Shite start to the month

I am becoming a true middle-aged moaner, but the weather is really pissing me off. I popped out today for some supplies, and everyone was wearing Winter coats, some of them accessorised by scarves and hats.
It’s ridiculous.
What we need is an acceleration of global warming so I can stop being cold in Spring, so if you could all go out for an unnecessary drive – preferably in a gas-guzzling, knackered old petrol vehicle – it would be much appreciated. Let’s work together on this people, and we can drive the average temperature up by 3 degrees by 2025 and be basking in Mediterranean splendour each March.

RC 1-5-21