Come and tell me your dull and unexciting news 9: Calmly through the day

[MissConductUS]

I've started a new one. Please join us and share the boring and mundane things happening in your world. It will be calming for all.

DH is back, this time with table and chairs from old house in car boot.

DD just came to tell me that the cat had stood on DS for the first time ever but that DS didn't like it. DS then came to tell me that the cat had put a paw on him and he instantly became suscipious that it was just an attempt to get tuna from him not a sign of love as she did it to DD yesterday and DD gave her a tin of tuna. DS said I opened my legs wide so cat wouldn't get any ideas to sit on me. Then he said she came round the other side of me and put 3 paws on me and it was like a cat Twister game. He said he then made his legs a bit unstable so cat went off him but went to swipe him as she was very cross he hadn't let her sit on him.

We think the Chinese / fish and chip / curry takeaway here has been taken over and prices have gone up 50p to £1 per dish but menu is the same. We are tight for money until house sale goes through so having a sweet and sour Uncle Bens with rice instead and trifle.

DS said in the end he waddled over the cat as if he was a penguin.

@Nydj. What happened to your Pandemic post? I had time to read it but not reply and now it's gone.

I read a chapter of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix to the DC before bed. It is not a fun book to read aloud. I think I will be letting Stephen Fry do the grunt work moving forwards.

@EggNogPegg, I asked MNHQ to delete it as, after posting it I realised that it was in very bad taste to post about it.

I bought Ds1 a new pair of wellies in town. His feet are now bigger than mine. Got a multipack of men's welly socks at the same time.

Japanese takeaway sounds lovely. Not sure where the nearest one is from here. I'm guessing around 50 miles.....
I am unreasonably excited about coming out of isolation on Thursday, but in the spirit of the thread, as we are in Wales, realistically the only things I will be able to do differently is go for a walk (yay!), visit the supermarket and go to work.
MissConductUS thank you! It looks lovely! How far away is the next nearest house?

Welcome @dementedma, @boatyardblues, and @Sunbird24, and thanks for sharing your calming news.

@Nydj - I missed that completely. Fear not, I'm sure it wasn't that bad.

@Spudlet - My DS was language delayed and had speech therapy, which was a huge help for him. Was it hard to obtain from your school catchment?

@EggNogPegg - I want new bath sheets but when they went on sale at Lands End they sold out before I could get a color I wanted.

@sproutsandparsnips - I took this picture this afternoon. It shows the side of our garage in the new color. The woods are part of the county nature preserve that borders our lot and it's a protected wetlands area. The house is built into the side of a hill, so it's one story in the front yard and two in the back, which is also why the deck is so high off the ground.

The takeout takeaway selection here is okay, but not great. We have lots of great pizza places but have been making our own since March. We don't have any of the big pizza chains in my area. They can't compete with the independents for quality. There are some decent Chinese options, but I completely lost my taste for Chinese food during my first pregnancy and it's never returned. There are some very good pub food and Mexican places we frequent, but one of our favorites has closed for the winter.

In other news, DH's new Perilli snow tires arrived today and are taking up a bit of room in the garage. They just shipped yesterday, so good service on delivery. DD has gone to work for the evening and DH is making grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner soon.

My apologies if my bit about Aaron Copland was too far off-topic. I'm pretty passionate about his music and can get carried away about it at times.

DD came out of her room to tell me how cold it is in there (16°C) great for sleeping but not so much for working - I offered to give her heater back but she refused.

I got two Ruth Goodman books (Tudor and Victorian) from DMil's christmas money.

sodding Your ds’s comment made me smile.

MissConductUS Aaron Copland is great. Am I correct in thinking he also composed Rodeo and something about Billy the Kid? I do like Simple Gifts. It reminds me of the hymn, Lord of the Dance.
Love the picture, thank you.

@MissConductUS. I enjoyed the Aaron Copeland chat. I particularly enjoyed listening to the Appalachian track today.

@Nydj. It was fine. I enjoyed the irony.

@Taswama. I have just been looking at wellies for DS1. He is one shoe size smaller than me now. I was considering a pair of bright yellow ones from Mountain Warehouse on Amazon for him.

I also listened to some Aaron Copeland today off the back of your riff MissC. Tangents are a good thing.

Our Chinese takeaway is on its way! I really didn't fancy cooking tonight.

I'm taking the car in tomorrow morning for new tires and new brakes. Will be very expensive, but very necessary from a safety point of view. There is no waiting area at the shop at the moment (Covid) and it's not like I can find a nearby cafe (also Covid) so DMum is going to drive her car down there with me to then turn around and drive me home. This is an extra special favour because she doesn't usually even get out of bed until 10 or 11!!

@sproutsandparsnips - He did write Rodeo and Billy the Kid. Both were ballet scores, like Appalachian Spring. He later scored all three pieces for full orchestra and those are the versions commonly performed today. He did quite well writing movie scores and was in much demand in Hollywood. Here's an excellent series of articles about him from the Library of Congress:

A Brief Introduction to the Music of Aaron Copland

He also wrote Fanfare for the Common Man at the request of the President during the darkest days of WWII as a way of lifting people's spirits. One thing that's probably not mentioned in these articles is that in his personal life he was openly gay, quite unusual during that era. The house where he lived for the last few decades of his life is open to the public and I've attended some lovely performances there.

Copland House

I'm glad you have enjoyed the tangent. I find great comfort in his music and I have really returned to it during the pandemic.

@sproutsandparsnips In the direction that photo was taken the nearest house is about a quarter mile away. There's one a bit closer in the other direction.

@Nydj I also enjoyed the irony, fear not!

@MissConductUS DS’s speech therapist has been a minor miracle for him. When he started seeing her, he could make no sounds that involved bringing his lips together. I found a sheet that I’d typed out for his preschool the other day trying to explain what the sounds he made meant - things like ‘eee-ug uh-gah’ meaning peanut butter. I don’t know how I ever understood anything he said, to be honest. Now he speaks at a totally age appropriate level and his therapy is all about the social rules of communication instead. We couldn’t get any publicly funded therapy though - we first saw an NHS therapist when he was 2 (they ran drop-in sessions where you got ten minutes as long as you turned up and waited), and although they referred us to the neurodevelopmental team for an ASD diagnosis, we’ve still received no therapy. We pay for his therapist privately. Our county is particularly awful for speech therapy, to the point that the body providing the NHS service has lost the contract recently. So perhaps one day, when he’s 25 or so, he might get some NHS therapy...!

I got up early today so I could get out for a walk with DH (early riser) to make the most of today’s limited sunshine. I was ready by 9am. Still waiting for DS1&2 to finish getting ready. 😞

I was going to go for a run first thing, but then I emptied the dishwasher, put on the second load of laundry, hung two loads out, made eggs/porridge for DC breakfast and washed up again afterwards, took DH coffee and breakfast in bed... now standing in the kitchen in my running gear trying to summon the will power to actually leave the house and then start today’s v long (but dull) to-do list.

@Spudlet
My DSis was told there was a problem with her DS's hearing bc he did not react to voices and didn't start to speak when he was 2, though he could hear other sounds (like the fridge being opened) alright - it was a battle to get a diagnosis and therapy.

@EggNogPegg - I got the wellies from shoe zone in our town centre. Mountain warehouse had a queue outside and are generally a bit pricier. Probably slightly better quality but for wellies that will only get a few month's wear x 2 (passed on to DS2), I don't really care.

I'm having a late breakfast of peanut butter on toast. I'm quite new to this taste sensation - I just put peanut butter on (no normal butter first) but my grandson (who introduced me to this delicasy) insists on both types of butter.

Delicacy even.

@Therainisback, with the butter under the peanut butter, doesn’t your grandson find that the peanut butter just slides around in a lump without spreading properly?

@Taswama. I did go to Shoezone but £12.99 was more than I was willing to pay for 'cheap' wellies when the MW ones on Amazon are £19.99.

@Therainisback. I'm never sure if I like peanut butter or not. I don't hate it when I eat it, but I'm not sure if I like it either.

Good morning thread denizens.

I slept an hour later than usual, which is very rare for me. Even the cats failed to wake me. I have laundry going now and everyone else is still in bed having a lie in.

@Spudlet - I had heard previously on MN that speech therapy was hard to get in the UK. Our school district provides it free to any child in the area, which makes sense when you consider that it's the schools that will have to deal with the issues it causes. When his pediatrician diagnosed it shortly after he turned two, she gave us a letter to take to the special ed department. They assigned a speech therapist who came to the house twice a week for an hour. She did diagnostic assessments, exercises and drills with him until he started school, then the school ST took over. It was still a hard slog with him and delayed his reading levels for a few years. We also read with him constantly. He's a very bright kid but it was a significant disability. He's fine now and doing really well in uni.

Eggy, I'm lukewarm on peanut butter too, unless it's combined with chocolate. Then it's the food of the gods.