Berrie, Lyra, Oggs (and Zeb?) chat thread

[LyraSilvertongue]

Hi, hope you find this thread. The old one was too big.
Varifocals eh? Not sure I'd fancy that.
DP took me out to lunch today, to The Ivy. Twas really nice, good food and service, great decor, lovely stained glass windows. I only saw one sleb - Trisha Goddard with (I presume) her daughter.
I had seared scallops with bacon, followed by the rib-eye with chips and creamed spinach (with too much nutmeg in it).
It's been a funny old week. The house is a tip because I've hardly been in it (except to catch up on sleep). We're off on holiday on Saturday morning and I've organised nothing. Gulp!

Helllllooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sorry you're having a crap time of it . Did it happen like I said? Did you like it?

I had a bad experience last time I was in hospital and I ended up writing all my grievances in a little notebook. I felt like a spy . I did bugger all about it but it made me feel better to write it all down.

Hope your buttock and bits resume normal service asap and you can get home.

Have you got your own tv and phone on an arm over your bed?
There is always a Constance or her equivalent. I had one who wet her bed and while the nurses were cleaning it, she sat on the chair next to my bed in her sodden nightie and wiped her bits on the dividing curtain.
Oh, you had to laugh .
They didn't even change the curtain despite me asking numerous times .

Today at "Chez Oggs"...
Dh cut his first planks from one of our trees using his new sawmill.
I watched aghast as the chickens caught and partially ate a toad.
Trying to be clever I accidentally deleted 4 years worth of my emails and contact addresses . So you'll have to email me your details again, and your blog address as I can't remember them.
I nearly choked on a fish bone.
Pip the pup got my knitting. She destroyed a ball of wool and now Jack Skellington has got one leg shorter than the other.

All riveting stuff eh? I bet it's much more interesting in there.

Hope you have a good nights sleep (((hugs)))

The after-care is always rubbish isn't it.
I hope you're getting some sleep. I know I didn't in hospital after having the boys with nurses and midwives clacking up and down the ward in their heels all night.
Well, today Chez Lyra I have met a friend for coffee then spent most of the rest of the school day shopping (hadn't been into town in weeks so lots to get).
After school the boys and I tried out my new Cookie Press from Pampered Chef and after a few false starts (and much creasing up with laughter at our miserable efforts) we made some pretty good cookies.
Then we watched the fireworks at a nearby school from the street outside our house, huddled up in our coats.
A really nice day

Any news?

?

?

I have a laptop!!!

DH here.
Berrie came home yesterday but still has a numb leg and needs crutches to walk. Today she has been suffering severe pains in the head. The surgeon suggests leaving it a couple of days to see if it settles down. If not she will need another scan. She will be back once she feels a bit better.

Oh, poor love .

Hope everything starts to settle down soon and she begins to feel more comfortable.
Give her my love and tell her I'm thinking of her.

Oh dear berrie, hope things settle down. Is your back any better? Oggs, you got the laptop early. How is it?

Haven't had chance to really use laptop yet Lyra.
Seems great. It's loaded with Vista but I can get a free upgrade to Windows 7.

Got to dash out to a party with dd now.

Berrie, hope you're feeling a little lot better.

I took Berrie to A&E this morning, after a night of horrible head ache attacks. If it gets wore they will give her a CT scan and MRI. Fortunately the last one was at 10 o'clock this morning and she has eaten for the first time in 2 days. Touch wood things are looking up!

Thanks for keeping us updated Mr Berrie. Fingers crossed that the headaches come to an end and she starts to feel better.

Any improvement today? Send her our love.
Oggs have you got the laptop up and running yet? Any good? Does this mean you'll finally be able to catch up with True Blood? Where were you up to anyway?

Lyra, I've got the laptop up and running with Vista but that's as far as I've got so far. I need to connect the router and attempt wireless connection (tbh I'm a bit nervous. It cost so much I'm scared to do anything with it other than look at it ).

I'm tackling the job of clearing up the pc.
So far I've managed to accidentally permanently delete all my emails (this also has a bearing on why I'm reluctant to touch new laptop )
In an attempt to order my photos I've downloaded Picasa. I have got almost 15,000 photos!!! . It's going to take me years to sort through them all .

Aargh! Have set Picasa's face recognition thingy going...

15,000 photos....
...a large quantity of which are taken at a festival where there are oodles of people in each photo... it's been running for nearly 6hrs and is still only 53% through...

What is Picasa?

"Picasa is a software download from Google that helps you organize, edit, and share your photos. It's free, and easy to use."

It has face recognition so that you can set up albums so that all photos featuring so and so can be lumped together. Trouble is I had 15,000 photos, many of which had tons of people in them, so I had to leave it running overnight and it found thousands and thousands of faces.
Not knowing how else to do it I've sat and (still am) gone through them all naming the ones I want it to look for in future.
It's certainly taught me that I need to be picky about saving photos and not just copy over hundreds of virtually the same picture. Gah!

Very, very cold and frosty here ths morning. Water almost frozen in the pipes. All standing water outside frozen.
Car had a flat tire, and the brakes had seized up. Pah!

It's cold and foggy here. I miss the warm sunshine.
I'm working today. At the moment I'm huddled up against the cold in bed with the laptop on my lap. Saves putting the heating on.
What kind of heating do you have? Just open fires?

Two burners; 1 burns anthracite (this one also heats the water and runs a radiator in each bedroom (although you have to choose - if you want hot water you can't run the radiators and vice versa)), and one wood burner.
Got both going at moment and am heating water.

We need to pump more water today but I think the pipe in the ground will be frozen so may be unable to. That will mean I can't do any washing, and we won't be able to have a bath either.

No word on Berrie.... I do hope she's on the mend.

That all sounds like a lot of work.
Hopefully with Berrie, no news is good news.

'Tis a lot of work. Plus having to get water to all the animals when it's frozen is a real time consumer.
Dh is out sawing up logs with his new sawmill. I'm still sorting sodding faces on Picasa. Will have to go and get dd in half an hour.

Busy news day, or is it quiet?

Fairly quiet. I'll be finished at 5.30 then I'll go and getthe boys from after school club.
I'm considering whether to take voluntary redundancy, which is on offer at the moment. The pay-off won't be huge but I've been here 10 years and feel it's well past time for a change. Redundancy would give me a kick up the backside to do something else.
On the other hand, where else am I going to find a job that pays reasonably and allows me to work one day a week? Plus, now's nota good time for job hunting, with the economy the way it is. Might be best to stay put for now.

Berrie was admitted yesterday. They've done a CT scan and there was talk about a lumbar puncture. The CT scan was OK. They don't seem to know what the problem is - she might have to have another MRI. We are just waiting for them to work it out now. At least she has access to morphine in hospital.

Oh no, hope she doesn't have to have another MRI. She hated the last one.
Fingers crossed for her.

Poor love - she's really having a rough time of it.
Please give her my love and tell her she is in my thoughts.
Hope you and the dc are bearing up okay - it must be difficult.