The Nordic Tearoom (Number 31)

[beanandspud]

We have moored the barge for the winter and have moved to a beautiful, cosy log cabin in deepest Scandinavia overlooking a frozen lake and surrounded by pine trees.

Mellors has lit the log fires and candles, it is snowing outside and there are comfortable seats for everyone and fleecy blankets to snuggle up in. For the more active tearoomers there are skis and sledges outside as well as a steaming hot tub for winding down after a busy day.

So pull up a chair. The kettle is on for and there is always plenty of depending on your mood and time zone. (Alternatively there is schnapps, smorgasbord and smoked fish).

Everybody is welcome ? share as much or as little as you like ? but no fisticuffs please!

My cameras are found!!

Hurrah! for the finding of Scout's cameras :)

Excellent news! and twiglets all round!

MrScout was taking one last look at the lost property thingy for Heathrow/BA and it's been turned in so we're filling out the form and calling in the morning. While I can't remember for sure whether things like my charger are in there (assume they are as that's where it lives) I can tell them things like the NT passport is there, where in the bag it is and what (the last) pictures are on the card in the camera.

I'm so happy I could cry!

good news about the camera scout, so glad someone handed it in! Restores ones faith in people being nice

I once left my passport, wallet, keys, plane ticket, credit card, traveller cheques and everything at the check in desk and got on a plane - got it all back, bar some cash, 3 days later - I still remember how utterly sick I felt when I first realised....

So happy for you Scout!!! :)

Further update - half-sister emailed DH to say that she'd received "a friendly email" (that's what he said she said) saying that April wasn't going to work out for a visit.

but also..... [shrugs] ok.

And... [huh????]

and also [whatever].

:o

JM - there you go. Flash in the pan. WTF was she emailing your DH for though? Does she think perhaps he didn't know?? Like you wouldn't have told him?

Scout - Yay! for finding the lost camera bag! I lost my bag once, on the flight back from Dublin. My whole luggage (large rucksack). It was the one and only time that I had put my cameras in the rucksack rather than keeping them in my hand luggage - and I lost it. Thankfully, it turned out they'd just forgotten to put it on the plane in Dublin and it came the next day, delivered to my house. Phew!

But I have lost a camera before. My house was burgled - once while I was away in Russia (big things went) and then again a week after I got back from Russia, when there were only little things to take. This was in the days before digital cameras, and I had two used rolls of film plus the one in the camera in the case - all went. My irreplaceable photos of Russia - the inside of the Bolshoi theatre, St. Basil's (Ok that one could be done again), Dad with friends, the Pravda sign, all the pictures of the crumbling of the communist regime. I did still have the photos of some of the places I had been because those rolls of film were elsewhere - but I lost a lot. :(
And yes - it is the loss of those memories, and also not being able to share them with others, who might never see those places themselves, that hurts.
Fuckers took my best pair of sunglasses too! (NOT expensive, I hasten to add - I just liked them!)

Unserp - bugger re. the email account. There is so much fraud and crime going on these days around electronic activity - it quite scares me that everything is moving towards us doing everything electronically and yet the safeguards just aren't good enough - no one is going to be safe.

Thumb, she gets along better with DH than with me. He's much nicer and more patient than I am, and also, there just isn't all that history that gets in the way. We don't share a family email address, so she's always emailed us separately. He entertained her quite a lot when she and my father came to visit when JB was 4 months old and still pretty much latched on 24/7. They played Wii quite a lot while I was snuggled up in the corner of the couch nursing JB thank god because I can't be arsed, Wii holds no fascination for me whatsoever so she had a good rapport with him. I do think she had a minor crush on him (which weirded him out no end when I said so, he was like "oh no - what - eewwww - nooooo, that's just wrong!!" :o) but regardless, she's kept in touch with him separately from me (and likely much more than with me) so that's why she'd have emailed him. It's still a bit stupid though - she can't have thought we wouldn't talk about it?? Or maybe she thought we didn't. Anyway, I don't care. Just thought it was funny.

Ah well - if she's calling it a friendly email then you can now forget about it completely. All's well that ends well and you get your birthday back for yourself! :)

Well I have no idea if she meant friendly in a sarcastic way (if she did it sailed right over DH's head) but I don't give a monkey's :o

But just watch it - maybe I'll have bad karma for not wanting her to come and will have the crappiest birthday ever :(
I feel sort of badly but I don't know why :(

Yesterday was not a good day. Wriggle made the most enormous fuss going to school, crying and crying, many parents/staff at my school wanted to tell me all about how my e-mail had attacked theirs and I ended up in tears in my school assembly when the music teacher stopped the whole school singing half way through the hymn because I had downloaded the wrong version of the words for him. I was taking the assembly.

This morning AP tells me that she thinks she has Alzheimers. I have been looking up symptoms/treatments on google and realise that there is no hope. She has handed over the problem for me to deal with as I see fit and I have made a GP appointment for Monday.

I have one morning to prepare for the next three days, including work with no e-mail.

I really really seriously need someone to just be here with me and there is no one.

What do I do?

Oh Serp. I'd try to come and help if I was physically closer (not sure how, but I can at least make tea!).

Toddler's had another marathon sleep I'm only just hearing him now (though I swear I heard him an hour ago but when I went in he was sleeping 6:30 p.m. until 10:45 a.m. Anyone who's jet-lagged toddlers tell me if this is normal and how long will it last?

Oh Serp! So very sorry - have an enormous (((hug)))
Your music teacher was a twat, IMO.

Your GP may be able to help your AP - even though Alzheimer's isn't exactly curable, there are things in progress now that may slow down the degeneration. As an aside, it might be worth getting her blood clotting checked - my grandmother's dementia was more as a result of mini-strokes in her brain, possibly related to the blood clotting disorder that is in our family (father's side) - and if it's to do with that, then blood thinners (warfarin, aspirin) can help to reduce the risk of clots and therefore help.

Email is a right bastard - can you set yourself up with a hotmail account as a temporary measure? And work through that? Or does your school have lockout of hotmail accounts?

Wriggle - get some Rescue remedy and put it in her morning drink, that might help.

Anything else we can help with?

re sleep- when boy is V tired he would sleep like that up to 4 nights , then one morning wake up at normal time (8am) bright as anything.

Bugger bugger bugger serp - sorry your having a shitty time with everything currently.
here have some and a

(((Hugs))) Unserp, don't know how else we can help, although if you want some appropriate phrases writing for reports or something like that we can have a brainstorm this evening.

Scout - so pleased you've got the camera back!

Thank you.
Sorry for moan - was having a real panic attack! Easing off now, probably because I am rushing around doing things. This afternoon I am going out to look after SmugFriends children while she takes her reindeer to the Christmas shopping evening at the Agricultural suppliers. Maybe not the best day for it - but then maybe, actually, just yhe distraction I need. And poor Wriggle, too, of course.
Rescue remedy for all, I think.
Report writing is not the issue atm; it is downloading youtube carols and making powerpoints for all the classes for Friday's Christmas concert for (ironically) the Village Old People. All the collecting photos and videos I always do by email.

can you set up a temporary emergency address - hotmail or gmail or something to tide you over? I know you won't have your contacts in there, but at least it would give a way of getting the info back.

Having a at potential report writing by long-distance committee ... could be grouped into positive working, too noisy, not enough attention etc categories.... If you set it up you might even be able to get a comupter to generate them

Unserp, heck and triple heck...
and heck to other situations as I'm reading through too.

and Mellors standing by for relaxing shoulder massages for those in need.

Serpent - First of all, lots of hugs.

There has been something not quite right with my email for months ::too much of an IT dunce to sort it emoticon:: but I can manage via the provider?s own site, even though it won?t download to Outlook. Could that work for you? Or creating a new address, even if you?re left without your contacts? Sadly, RL would prevent me coming down for the next week or so but you know I?ll do what I can from a distance. Likewise, if you can escape for a day and fancy the cup that cheers in the Smoke, just say the word.

I hope the GP can help AP. If she has indeed got both PTSD and Alzheimer?s then that must be very frightening and bewildering for her and hard going for you. As always, you have my limitless admiration for the way you shoulder things and get on with it. Please accept this totally inadequate gift for yourself.

Could someone please give me a swift kick?

I could, but you need to convince me first!

::violence is never the answer::

Kick

there you go scout.

what you meant to be doing then lass?
I'm meant to be phoning my mother... better go do it.