60th Wedding Anniversary

My parents celebrated their diamond wedding anniversary. Too old to organise it, too tired, too fragile, they weren't going to do anything, and when my brother #2 asked told him so, and said,

"You want something, you organise it."

And he did. He and his lovely wife organised us getting up there, booked our hotel, contacted our cousin to borrow her holiday cottage for some of us, arranged the evening meal, ferried elderly parents and aunt to and fro. He even told the Queen and she sent a card of congratulations.

We had a celebratory mass in the morning, followed by lunch on the church lawn with the St Vincent de Paul Society people helping. (Did you know how much this charity does for old people and others that are excluded? They work quietly, behind the scenes, visiting, liaising with families, driving people to events or doctors when they can't get there themselves.)

In the evening, the family shared a meal at a local hostelry, toasted the happy couple. It's nearly my brother #1 and his wife's 30th anniversary, and they brought out the card that my parents had given them 30 years ago, where they'd written,

The first thirty years are the worst

Brother and wife brought original card, and added their annotation:

You were right
The first thirty years were terrible. Any tips for the next thirty years?

My cousin wrote and sang a song for us.

Happy anniversary
to a couple most fair
to Jean and Joe
a diamond pair!

It was great seeing my family together, my family that lives in America and came over for the occasion, my cousin and his wife, my sister and every one. We exchanged casual news over Yorkshire beers, learned where we are with our jobs at the moment, and who has a new partner and where people are living or planning to move to, or what people are studying at the moment. I miss some of them, living far away.

This was a lovely opportunity and a happy occasion. And I hope that my brother #1 and his wife have a lovely 30th (pearl) wedding anniversary next month.

Ruby wedding anniversary

Husband's university friends have been married much longer than us. Today a couple celebrated their fortieth wedding anniversary by inviting loads of their long term friends for a trip on the River Isis from Oxford. The boat was covered with ruby red balloons and streamers, with around 80 friends. We ate, we drank, we talked. The weather was great, neither too hot nor too cold.

One of husband's friends from college (see reunion here) is partner to a fellow post-graduate student at the Open University, so we spent some time happily comparing notes on our progress, our supervisors, theory (Bourdieu if you're interested), and we admonished anyone who dared ask, "When are you finishing?" That sort of question is one you just do not ask a post grad student - it's as rude as asking a woman how old she is - as this grad comic illustrates.

And just to add to that insult, someone asked me if I'd used my bus pass to get there today. I'm not only too young to get a bus pass yet, but they've raised the age at which I'll be eligible for it. So insults, unintentional insults flew round the boat.

These insults were not as bad though as those in today's Times Style magazine, in which AA Gill slated The Oxford Ashmolean restaurant and Oxford people - calling its female students "lesbians in blue stocking", and the restaurant "full of very old people. A sea of thin white hair." As the director of the Ashmolean met fellow PG and FPG's partner this morning, he was railing about the review. FPG's partner has something to do with the Ashmolean museum so the encounter meant they nearly missed the boat, and then they wouldn't have been able to tell me how rude the Times was.

It was a lovely day with lots of lovely intelligent and cheerful people to talk to. Perhaps AA Gill of the Times doesn't know what intelligent conversation can be about.

I wonder which college rejected him.

Tenth wedding anniversary

Husband wins brownie points for wedding anniversary present. Ten is tin or pewter, and I once had champagne glasses with pewter stems. He's got two silver stemmed (with hearts) champagne glasses engraved for us.

Magic afternoon

We celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary with lots of family. Step-son reminded us of who has joined us in the ten years that we've been married. We've gained a son-in-law and a daughter-in-law and five more grandchildren. They're all lovely.

Tenth wedding anniversary

Ten years and still together. Hurrah!

Tin for ten.

Austrian visitors

A few years ago we had some Austrian girls stay with us for a couple of weeks. This evening one of them is coming back with two friends for the night, and in August, two others are coming back with their friends, when we'll have five girls staying for a few weeks. August will be busy.

Guitar hero mum

Here's a first for me. I've at last played my first PS2 game even though it was around 1998 that son first bought a second hand play station. He had to plug it in himself to the video and TV system and I've not had control of its programming ever since.

Recently he got a game called Guitar Hero, and daughter, back from uni, has been playing it. She decided to get a second controller and persuaded me to leave my sewing to join in. I've been playing something of Blur's and Coldplay. It's fun, heaps easier than real guitar and a new way of listening to the music because you can move with it, which I like.

Wow! Go me!