You're very cute. I know.
Saturday 30th November:
Terrible sleep. Woke at 04:30 feeling dehydrated. Rehydrated myself then consequently couldn't get back to sleep and had to make multiple nocturnal visits to the lav. It was a groggy David who set off to parkrun on a damp and misty morning. Strangely mild, however, and I was quite warm by the time I arrived.
Ninth place today, and pleasingly faster than last week, with a gap of less than a minute to my Sunny Hill PB. I was scanning again today, although the usual feelgood factor I get from volunteering was extinguished by one of the other volunteers being annoyingly bossy about ordering the tokens, which upset me unduly. However, a random stranger asked when I was making another of my daft David Barnett's Great Parkrun Journeys videos so I felt like the equilibrium of the universe was restored.
Joined Aaron and a couple of others for a coffee afterwards. He is a very nice chap. He is also a freelancer so we had a lot of shop chit chat about IR35 and other thrilling topics.
Daisy was at a party in the afternoon so not arriving until just before bedtime. I took the opportunity of a free afternoon to return my library books and buy a Christmas tree. I'd fancied supporting our local economy by buying one from the convenience of the garden centre, but they cost about three times more than the equivalent offering in Tesco. So there I went. I got as far as the bus stop with it before realising that I would struggle to carry it all the way home. As I embarked the 382 the driver said what I thought was "do you have a boarding pass for that?" I presumed this was a joke and cheerily replied, don't worry driver, it's under two years of age. He did not appreciate this at all and made it very clear he was in charge, although I wasn't sure how I was supposed to respond. "Sure, you're the boss!" I beamed, struggling to my seat. "Thank you driver!" I bellowed as I disembarked. Annoyingly the 382 only goes as far as the bottom of the hill so the final mile up the hill was quite a challenge.
Happily the Barratts sales people were doing a final Christmas push for the remaining flats, with free mulled wine, mince pies and a festive choir. I got there just in time for the last mulled wine (having had one on the way too).
Was very pleased to get the tree up without too much collateral damage. Despite a relatively stressful day I felt incredibly anxious. I can only put this down to drinking last night, vaping, and arguing with strangers on the internet after someone suggested that "illegal immigrants have taken over". I pointed out that even the largest estimates suggested 3%, and although that was alarmingly high, I doubted that few of them had their hands on the levers of power. Someone said the number was more like 18%, which by a staggering coincidence is the total ethnic minority proportion of the population in England & Wales.
I appreciate that none of these things are nourishing for mind and body, no matter how much fun they might be.
Fortunately, such thoughts were banished when Daisy arrived full of cheer, pleasingly excited about the tree, and sporting a party bag full of bright blue cake and other treats. Her mother had said she wouldn't need tea, but as requested I had provided some healthy snacks such as pink lady apples and pineapple chunks. However, the cake was definitely the winner. Daisy asked if she could "make something". This is shorthand for rearranging all the furniture. I said sure, as long as she was aware it would soon be bedtime. When bedtime did arrive, she suddenly piped up that she was hungry and could she have pizza? We skipped bath time and I got round the usual teeth brushing battle by allowing her to brush them in bed.
I asked her about giving some of her baby books - That's Not My Lion and so on - to the new arrival next door. As a result we read several of those for the last time. I felt quite emotional. Daisy was very good at improvising. "It's tongue is too licky!" (actually fuzzy).
"You are very cute Daisy!" I said.
"I know!" she replied, paraphrasing my favourite sequence from Star Wars.
It was about an hour after her normal bedtime before she finally fell asleep. I read a some of Peter Cook's Daily Mail articles from 1977. I was surprised to see a few Sex Pistols references. He calls them the Sex Pickles. A few pages on he namechecked Verushka and Viv Nicholson and I loved him even more.
Today's expenditure:
2x coffees at Sunny Hill cafe: £6.27
Christmas tree: £15.00
Christmas tree stand: £10.00
Melon: £1.89
Spreadable butter: £2.09
Pink lady apples: £2.50
Pineapple chunks: £1.75
Cheese strings: £1.35
Minus voucher: -£3.50
Tesco sub-total: £41.08
Bus: £1.75
Total: £49.10
Alcohol consumption: 2x small cups of mulled wine