Life Before Christmas
This week has been spent trying to catch up on the couple of weeks I've lost pre-Christmas. At least the Internets have been a great help. Oh, and that inamac and I have decided on "token" pressies this year, as the house needs a new computer- and new carpets and a new boiler and a new sink, but let's get our priorities right here, folks.
Speaking of inamac, she was finally persuaded to take Casino to the V-E-T (he's her cat, though I paid for him. She paid for Ellie. However, both decided on whose person they were,and it had nothing to do with money. Cas has never forgotten which one of us hauled him out from his hiding place and to the vet when he had injured himself quite badly and very painfully. I am not a KIND PERSON.) He'd lost an awful lot of weight and had developed some strange eating habits. (i.e. he would approach a bowl of food, snatch a piece and run with it, even when alone in the room with said bowl.) I'm not sure we've got to the bottom of things despite massive blood testing, an equally massive exploratory operation which found a stone-like object not in his digestive system but in his body cavity and huge doses of antibiotics. (This is why we insured our cats from the beginning. It costs a good deal of money, but we'll probably get all this year's premium back for this particular case, even though the excess for a 12 year old cat is over £100.) He's back home now, being fed high protein food in small doses, and living with his sister in the front room. It has to be said, though, that Scott-the-vet is ringing to check on him this morning, and he has to be back at the surgery tomorrow for another anti-biotic injection. Also to be checked on.
Meanwhile, yesterday I came close to finishing my Christmas shopping, prior to meeting my Dad at Victoria-Coach-Station-Otherwise-Known-As-Hades. Dad got his mobile to work well enough to tell me they were making great time (the problem is not with the phone, but with the fact that Dad uses it so rarely he hasn't got the hang of it.) When I first checked on the M1 motorway, down which the coach travels, it was amazingly clear of problems. My mistake was refreshing the screen. At this point, among other things, it revealed overturned vehicles and a complete motorway blockage. Oh, wonderful. At least it gave me time to do what I had forgotten to do at lunchtime, and go to the Neal's Yard Cheese Shop. Where the queue went down the street, with a guard on the door to enforce order and radio for pre-orders. (No, I am not kidding.)
Mind you, my colleague P. phoned just before I left the office. Had he left his car keys on the desk? Yep, under a folder. Unfortunately, he was phoning from the car park at the end of his train line, and this necessitated coming all the way back to the office (about 45 minutes) and going out again. Dad wasn't delayed that much, and we got home reasonably safely.
Last night's dinner was Delia's sausages in cider sauce recipe - the one from Frugal Food where you had better not follow it exactly, or you'll end up with cold, partially cooked sausages. (She forgets to tell you to put them back to cook in the sauce. There's also a recipe in there she lists an ingredient and never tells you what to do with it.) One always forgets how long this takes to do, but never how good it tastes. Yum.
Speaking of inamac, she was finally persuaded to take Casino to the V-E-T (he's her cat, though I paid for him. She paid for Ellie. However, both decided on whose person they were,and it had nothing to do with money. Cas has never forgotten which one of us hauled him out from his hiding place and to the vet when he had injured himself quite badly and very painfully. I am not a KIND PERSON.) He'd lost an awful lot of weight and had developed some strange eating habits. (i.e. he would approach a bowl of food, snatch a piece and run with it, even when alone in the room with said bowl.) I'm not sure we've got to the bottom of things despite massive blood testing, an equally massive exploratory operation which found a stone-like object not in his digestive system but in his body cavity and huge doses of antibiotics. (This is why we insured our cats from the beginning. It costs a good deal of money, but we'll probably get all this year's premium back for this particular case, even though the excess for a 12 year old cat is over £100.) He's back home now, being fed high protein food in small doses, and living with his sister in the front room. It has to be said, though, that Scott-the-vet is ringing to check on him this morning, and he has to be back at the surgery tomorrow for another anti-biotic injection. Also to be checked on.
Meanwhile, yesterday I came close to finishing my Christmas shopping, prior to meeting my Dad at Victoria-Coach-Station-Otherwise-Known-As-Hades. Dad got his mobile to work well enough to tell me they were making great time (the problem is not with the phone, but with the fact that Dad uses it so rarely he hasn't got the hang of it.) When I first checked on the M1 motorway, down which the coach travels, it was amazingly clear of problems. My mistake was refreshing the screen. At this point, among other things, it revealed overturned vehicles and a complete motorway blockage. Oh, wonderful. At least it gave me time to do what I had forgotten to do at lunchtime, and go to the Neal's Yard Cheese Shop. Where the queue went down the street, with a guard on the door to enforce order and radio for pre-orders. (No, I am not kidding.)
Mind you, my colleague P. phoned just before I left the office. Had he left his car keys on the desk? Yep, under a folder. Unfortunately, he was phoning from the car park at the end of his train line, and this necessitated coming all the way back to the office (about 45 minutes) and going out again. Dad wasn't delayed that much, and we got home reasonably safely.
Last night's dinner was Delia's sausages in cider sauce recipe - the one from Frugal Food where you had better not follow it exactly, or you'll end up with cold, partially cooked sausages. (She forgets to tell you to put them back to cook in the sauce. There's also a recipe in there she lists an ingredient and never tells you what to do with it.) One always forgets how long this takes to do, but never how good it tastes. Yum.