Christmas in the Mendips

I spent four nights over Christmas at a hotel in Loxton, December walks in wind that blows you over, dripping nose and despite good walking boots that I’ve worn before, I got a blister and couldn’t do the third day of walking. I spent it wandering around Wells, its cathedral and bishop's palace moat.

The hotel food was like school dinners - sloppy. No fruit, no cheese course. The last dinner offered pork casserole, but when it came it not only had little pork but looked like a gelatinous mess. Dee said she would write to the hotel to complain. Nevertheless, I’m grateful someone else planned, someone else cooked, and served, and someone else is washing up.

I’ve people to talk to, 24 ramblers, Justin was here last year and Sue. Not here not in Loxton but with RWW at Malvern in the Abbey hotel.  Deb from London though born in Blackpool has had BC and so has Gwen. Gwen has done the Zoe programme and we had a long discussion about its benefits and what we'd learned from it. Her partner / husband Ray, worked at the RAE in the seventies and eighties. He was a scientist who counts, a metrologist. Metrologist not a meteorologist. I thought that was combinatorics. It’s not statistics. Dee works in Scotland. Helen couldn't walk because she'd broken her foot. When one of the leaders, Jon, asked her about gluten-free bread she explained about good food and unprocessed food and timing of meals - all the things that Gwen had reported on from learning on her Zoe programme. In the morning, Jon said he'd looked it up and would follow up.

Christmas 2015

23rd visited family in Oxford
24th visited family in Buckinghamshire
25th entertained family at home
26th visited family in Hertfordshire
27th entertained family who were banned from visiting most people because of chicken-poxy three year old - poor mite.  He called it Christmas pox.  Got a sense of humour that lad.

Didn't have to travel as far as last year, so it was enjoyable, without the stress of driving.

Roll on 2016, and we're looking forward to the panto this weekend.  Oh yes we are!  Happy New Year

Holiday topics

Toastmaster topics master this week asked us to speak about holidays, e.g.

• "What is the best holiday you have ever had?"  
• "Do you prefer to holiday on the beach, or have a more active holiday like cycling?  Explain"
• "Would you holiday in the UK or go overseas?    Why"

One of us had to speak to, "Have you ever had a disaster on holiday", which should elicit a humorous litany of woes, but had she asked me to speak, it would have upset the room. The most disastrous holiday I ever had ended at a quarter to one on 23 August 1996. When the disaster happened, the holiday ended. Another of the topic questions was, "would you take out holiday insurance?" That August we had insurance as usual, but only for the usual four out of the five of our party, and I had to pay out a couple of hundred pounds to get one of us home!  Do I need to assure you that now I always have insurance?

The last topic was open to the room, "has anyone gone abroad on Xmas day?".  Yes - and that was probably one of my most memorable holiday, if only because it was the first one I had away from my parents and family when I was 22.  Booked in summer, whilst suffering from a party-induced hangover, my housemate and I flew to an Austrian skiing resort, Mayerhofen.  Housemate got all the gear, onesie ski-suit, gloves, hat, and I, not knowing if I'd like it, wore my English weather water-proofs.  Housemate put on her skis for the first time in our first class, faced up the hill, stood up, and slid backwards, thus promptly falling over.  She went back to the hotel where she spent the rest of the week, kindly donating me her fantastic onesie, a  garment I wore there and then, and for many years after both skiing and later on winter gliding fields.  I discovered I loved skiing and had some aptitude for it. I spent Christmas lunch alone on the top of a mountain, outside an Austrian ski restaurant, eating my sandwich and enjoying the cold crisp wonderful Alpine air - a good Christmas holiday.

Christmas lunch out

We went out for Christmas lunch, just husband, self and daughter, the fewest I've been with since ever.  Husband arranged it only last week, at the last minute, after I'd suggested we go and stay in hotel like his brother and family has done for years, perhaps join brother but his brother has been travelling to foreign places this year, like Venice, so perhaps didn't fancy another hotel for Christmas.  Then husband found this lovely local place, run by people who run our nearest wine bar, great food, even if you do silly diets - it's still great food, run by great hosts who deal with you in a friendly and tolerant fashion even if you can't make your mind up and there's a queue behind you.  If I did food photos, I'd show you, but here instead is the menu.

Travelling

Travelling was the order of the day that first Christmas. The priest at Christmas mass reminded us of those travellers to Bethlehem. And I remembered that we'd travelled to see my parents, my daughter had travelled to get home to us, that the roads of England were chockablock with travellers for Christmas.

Last year we fetched my parents to us, but this year they are too frail to make the journey, even if we fetch them, so devoted husband suggested that we went up there and did Christmas for them, and aged aunty. Husband loves baking Christmas cake, mince pies, plum pudding, and willingly did the turkey, trimmings and vegetables. Then on Boxing Day we went to watch Mother Goose in the Georgian theatre with aged aunty. Aged aunty enjoyed it - it was her suggestion that we went to the pantomime, though she complained the fun was spoilt by an older woman who wanted her to come in the lift with her as if aunty were a hundred!

And now we've travelled home again, leaving parents quiet for a few days before my brother visits them.

Xmas day

Xmas eve farce

Christmas starts:

• Mother has forgotten the spare batteries for her hearing aid.
• The flat roof above the visitor's room is leaking, so has dripped onto mother-in-law's bed all night.
• Aunty is cold.
• Husband is stressed.
  

Mother-in-law has spare hearing-aid batteries for mother. We've moved mother-in-law's bed, covered it with a plastic table cloth, put a bucket under the drip, and woken up teenager in the attic to go through her bedroom to shovel the snow off the darned damp roof!

In the sitting room we now have two radiators on and a halogen heater and a oil filled radiator.

We go and watch a pantomime this afternoon.

Sunday before Xmas

Husband has in the last week:

• made many batches of mince pies,
  
• boiled Xmas puddings,
  
• practised making vegetarian pies and soups for the vegetarian visitors,
  
• bought brandy butter (which is delicious on his home baked walnut and sultana bread)
• set up the Christmas tree
• wrapped Christmas presents
• written dozens of cards
  
• put lights on the stair window
• fixed a broken fuse
• explained the problem with the shower to the plumber.

Today I've:

• moved a double bed and two singles into different rooms
• made five beds
• shopped for a new duvet
• done three loads of laundry
• put lights up in the conservatory
• written a dozen Christmas cards
• wrapped some more presents
  

As sister-in-law used to say, "we've been diliging" - that is we've been very diligent and done lots of work.

Roll on Christmas! Let the visitors arrive!

Post Christmas quiet

All is quiet again now. They've all gone back and I shall miss them. I shall miss the philosophical chats with son. We have debated the relative merits of particular approaches to research, and we had a great chat in the pub his last night home.

Daughter went back today. Her step-dad took her. Last night she was the chattiest she'd been for ages, and I really enjoyed her company.

Step-daughter #2 sent a lovely thank you card.

Step-daughter #3 got back to her rented house to find a huge electricity bill, and that her course work was many words too short, so wasn't so cheerful. But between us, I think her parents have helped sort those out a bit.

A ring at the door bell and step-daughter #1 is passing - 5 minute chat and away again. At least we have one child still with us and we have her children to look forward to as well.

Christmas day

Ten o'clock in the morning. All is calm. Husband and I have prepared the sprouts, he has prepared the goose which is now sitting in the oven waiting to cook. Son, daughter and visitor are still asleep. Son and daughter went to midnight mass, but although visitor & I meant to go, we were both so sleepy that we backed out, I literally at the front door with my coat on and yawning.

Visitor is a Chinese girl, a fellow PhD student who is desperately trying to start writing up her research. She's collected thirty interviews, transcribed them and then translated them but she's running late so working over the Christmas break when the university is closed. We've done her a stocking - or rather SD#3 mugged her dad for money and went and got stuff for her, like bouncing putty, a tiny flower press, a red scarf, some highlighter pens - useful for study work. I found her a head girl badge and added the traditional chocolate coins, apple and satsuma (why can't I find satsumas? I had to use a tangerine!)

SD#3 has spent the night over at her sister and husband's. She went to carol service with them and held the notes on the organ - she rang at 8 o'clock this morning to tell her dad not to get frazzled and that they were coming to see him not eat his food. I think he might be frazzled at such an early phone call!

Christmas preparation

Christmas preparations include getting the pudding ready. I was going to put a short video here, but I haven't yet got the technology right to show it.

I've been wrapping presents for the surprise parcel - half a dozen for one nephew and half a dozen for the other. They get to unwrap them at their parents' leisure, not on Xmas day. Aunty P used to do this for us, and we'd unwrap them on Christmas Eve, that quiet wet dull day when school has finished, but you can't have your presents yet. She would find, wrap and send to all four of us - and she also had to deal with her own five children - what a lot of work! She used to send me pencils with my name on - really useful, and an Enid Blyton diary - fab! (means cool in today's lingo)

AOTRA dinner

Aylesbury Old Town Residents Association held their Christmas dinner in the Rockwood.





I took some photos.

And some more.