Come and tell me your dull and unexciting news 11: 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.

Ha, Prokupatuscrakedatus (can I call you Prok even if I am new?) You are the chosen one. Jonny Boden used to send me no end of correspondence and chirpy emails until he realised he was wasting his postage costs. Shame really, used to brighten up my mornings. It's raining here which means I am going to have to drive to work for the first time in about a week. It has reminded me that I left the car with only enough petrol to get to the station. Might just wear my wellies and walk.

@lurch3r
Is this a batch of distincion then? I am neither in th right area nor do I have children of the right age.
It' s raining here, too, and of course you can call me Prok.

Dull news for you all:
My tiny regional league football team is in the quaterfinals of the cup. My dad would be so happy!

Prok your English is so perfect, are you sure you're German...?

I had a coconut flat white yesterday and it was magnificent.

My friend text me to say she has a stray tiny kitten who has cat flu, cue me rushing round with the choicest pieces of snapper ( while my dogs side eye me and her dogs apoplectic that the normal level of fuss was directed at the cute, ill bundle) vet reasoned he had been abandoned, medicated and eating well. Cannot resist a kitten.

In other news, absolutely stoked to find Bovril back in our supermarkets, COVID has obviously cause shipping delays, never thought I’d be this excited about a spread for my toast ( can now discard the smeary empty jar in my cupboard).

Today is The Day... argh argh argh 😬 🦷 😱🥷

I wish I spoke another language. My mum speaks French. Obviously as a child I knew better and refused to get on board with her trying to get us to speak it at home.

I have an oat latte. It’s OK, but I am not inspired to switch from dairy.

@toria658

My friend text me to say she has a stray tiny kitten who has cat flu, cue me rushing round with the choicest pieces of snapper ( while my dogs side eye me and her dogs apoplectic that the normal level of fuss was directed at the cute, ill bundle) vet reasoned he had been abandoned, medicated and eating well. Cannot resist a kitten.

In other news, absolutely stoked to find Bovril back in our supermarkets, COVID has obviously cause shipping delays, never thought I’d be this excited about a spread for my toast ( can now discard the smeary empty jar in my cupboard).

Don't discard it; rinse it out to use in a casserole first.

Hello everyone, I don’t know how you non-sleepers cope - I was awake for an hour or so in the middle of the night and awoke up tired and fed up to even go for a walk before work today - am such a lightweight!

Well, that was a complete and utter fiasco. Got to the town where my dentist is with ten minutes to spare(plenty of time) only to find that the main road was closed and as I don’t know the area well, I couldn’t find my way round the back roads and ended up following the official diversion. All of which took 45 minutes and used all my petrol up, and no one was picking up the phone at the dentists for a good half hour, at which point they said they had no appointments left today and rebooked me in for next week. All in all I was driving for two hours by the time I got home, apart from a couple of stops for fuel, trying to call the dentist and trying to find a quicker route on my phone. It was horrifically stressful for someone who hates being late and I definitely had a screaming meltdown behind the wheel at more than one point and cursed whoever set such a stupid diversion out.

So now I’m home and my tooth still isn’t fixed, and I have to do it all again next week 😖 Ugh.

Spudlet I was stressed reading that never mind living it!! I hope you can take it very easy for the rest of the day now

Aaargh @Spudlet, what a nightmare. I have that with the town nearest me. Every time I go there is another roundabout.

Not doing very well at working, but have booked my car in for an MOT and ordered some paint samples in various shades of blue.

That sounds incredibly stressful Spudlet, why on earth didn’t they answer the phone so you could explain?

MissConduct that’s a lot of snow - your birds will be extremely grateful for the feeder. Remind me again whereabouts you are and what sorts of woodpeckers you get? I recently discovered the Twitter feed of someone who hand-feeds birds and she gets a lot of downy and red-bellied woodpeckers. We don’t have them in the UK, or the other lovely little birds she sees. She makes wonderful films of them swooping onto her hand - Jocelyn Anderson Photography

Welcome, @toria658, and thanks for sharing your kitten and shopping news. No one can resist a kitten. It's one of their magical powers. I have to be careful not to pick one up out of fear that I'll have to take it home, which our existing cats would not like at all. I had to google Bovril. Apparently, it was banned in the US during the mad cow era and now can only be found in specialty shops that import British foods.

Spudlet, I'm so sorry you had to go through all of that, particularly when you were stressed about the whole thing. I hope the tooth isn't bothering you too much. You poor dear. (hug).

@HildaTablet When they did pick up, the woman told me she was the only person on reception and was having to escort patients in and out of the building and deal with the phones. Apparently lots of people were having the same problem with the roads. She sounded almost as harassed as I felt.

Poor woman. They’ve probably had all their appointments messed up by the roadworks.

There are now 4 sets of temporary traffic lights on my 20 minute drive to work. All attended by men in high vis. Obvs.

Apparently even staff members were getting lost trying to make it through. Absolute nightmare for all involved!

@Spudlet
That's bad for you - when you've prepared yourself and then it does not happen.

@HildaTablet - I'm in an area north of New York City called the Hudson Highlands:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hudson_Highlands

I am not a huge birder but I think that's a red-bellied woodpecker. They're pretty common here on the east coast. And annoying when they decide to peck on the cedar shingles we have covering the house.

And yes, the birds were very happy to have the feeder when the snow-covered all of their usual food sources. They were queuing all day, and it wasn't unusual to have three or four on the feeder at a time.

Ah well in that case I take it back Spudlet. Sounds as though everyone had a nightmare day

I’m going to have to stop on the way home and get some milk. I can’t guarantee that some cake won’t also fall into my shopping basket. (Essential Cake, that would be.)

We had a phone call: DH's OP has been moved forward to Friday. So everything we have to do beforehand is crammed into the next two days.
It's been raining all day, but I got only slightly damp.

DS did a maths exam, French, geography and history with me as well as bits of drama. He had great fun making up a French CV.

I cancelled our booking for Lundy in May as its not half term and got deposit back as credit voucher to use by end of 2022, also realised they didn't cover covid cancellations.

Exchange is tomorrow again only tomorrow never seems to come but eventually it must, still saying completion on Friday. DH and DD have gone down for final clear of house, meter readings and bins out, well DH is doing that, DD is just bored so accompanying him.

Looked at using Avios points but not much can use them for at the moment, so go 6 bottles of prosecco and means the rest are valid 3 years.

@Spudlet what a nightmare. Just been out and done our 👏🏻

@Squirrel26

I’m going to have to stop on the way home and get some milk. I can’t guarantee that some cake won’t also fall into my shopping basket. (Essential Cake, that would be.)

I sometimes come home from the supermarket with Ben & Jerry's ice cream that must have jumped into the cart trolley when I wasn't looking. So don't beat yourself up if some cake sneaks into yours.

Will it make life more difficult?

My municipality owns a fleet of snow ploughs - I suspect more than the whole of my native Ireland does. They salt the streets ahead of predicted storms and then work all night clearing snow as it falls.

One difficult bit about a big snowfall is getting out of the alleys. They get around to ploughing the alleys once the snow stops. It's an old suburb, laid out on a grid, with all the backyards backing onto alleys and all the garages opening onto the alleys, very few attached garages, with all the garbage bins out at the alleys too. I drive a SUV with 4WD, but people in sedans get around ok thanks to the clearing of streets and a lot of shoveling after the alleys have been ploughed. It's very flat here too, but the alleys are hard to get into as there's a slight slope up from street to alley level. Plus there are usually mounds of snow at the entrance to the alleys as people shovel their sidewalks and all that snow has to go somewhere...

Navigating a supermarket car park isn't great. Snow gets ploughed into corner parking spots, which cuts down the number of parking spots. It also gets ploughed against perimeter fences, making spaces shorter and aisles more narrow. Plus it's hard to push a trolley through snow, slush, and ice. Your best bet is to pull your trolley.

I have kept a shovel in my car ever since I got home from work one day to find I had to dig myself into my parking spot after digging out that morning (thanks to the ploughing of the alley while I was away).

In the big city next door they usually don't get around to ploughing the side streets and alleys for longer, and as parking is limited there's a good deal of possessiveness about spots that residents have sweated blood for dug out.

www.thrillist.com/entertainment/chicago/chicago-parking-dibs-the-unwritten-rules-thrillist-chicago

chitownclothing.com/products/dibs-parking-shirt
Entrepreneurial spirit.

We're expecting freezing rain, sleet, and snow on Thursday, followed by an Arctic spell for the following five days, so I'm going to do some shopping this afternoon. I'm not looking forward to driving on ice.