Tiny Tantrums

I have a friend who has a two and a half year old daughter and I'm known to her as Grumples which is a mix of grandpa, uncle and plain old grumpy!

Well .... I thought I was grumpy until the other day when I collected her from nursery !! When I got there she was asleep and although she stirred, she was not happy about being woken up ... understandably perhaps and nor would I be. It's not the first time that I had woken her up but usually she had a smile on her face but not this time .. oh no .... she threw a complete tantrum like I had never seen before ... I couldn't placate her .. the girls at the nursery couldn't placate her .. it was " no noo NOOOO" .... Anyway .. to cut a long story short, eventually we managed to get her into the pushchair and after we had got outside and she had some fresh air for a while she calmed down ....

The funny part was when she turned to me on the way home and shouted at me ... "don't wake me up again grumples" .. well that told me didn't it !!!

Anyway ... I got back in her good books by taking her to the park and going on teh slide with her .. so I think I'm forgiven ..... for now anyway "

Finally laid to rest

It's been a strange last few days ... Although my sister passed away around 6 months ago, the family have not been able to agree where she would have wanted her ashes scattered as although she said that she did want them scattered, she didn't specify where.

Then of course, there is the potential beauracrasy that has to be dealt with to be able to scatter ashes in a specific place. Anyway, let's just say that we got around that and thankfully, my sister's ashes have now been scattered in a place that I feel she would be happy with.

Shortly after she died, I promised that I would make a will, having seen how tricky things can be. Sadly, I still haven't got around to it, but I am keen to have my ashes scattered somewhere that I want when I finally go so I need to contact a local solicitor and arrange to have a will made out I think ... not being pessimistic though .. I hope I have a long time left yet .. but you never know !

The Weekend that Wasn't

That was a bit of a strange weekend really. I felt kind of edgy for most of it and realised eventually, that maybe some of this and other things I'd noticed, like grinding my jaw more than usual, were probably stress related signs.

So from today, I am determined to chill a little more .. take my time and not rush from one thing to the next and maybe even take a few very short breaks to sit quietky and just breath. Not meditate as such but I guess a basic relaxation technique as a respite from the rush. My suspicion is that I'll also get a lot more done if I do that.

Still a bit sad about West Ham being relegated but Nottingham Forest play tonight so hopefully they wll eventually get promoted so that I have at least one team to watch in the Premier league next season.

Planning on cooking a version of Ackee and Saltfish tonight (but made with tinned mackerel) ... will be better than my very dissapointing Monkfish and Prawn curry from Marks and Spencer last night anyway.

Oh well .. back to work ... mainly working writing some dental copy today but hope to find time to write a short article .. probably the one inspired by a conversation last night. Bit of a strange one but guess not much written about them ... Toby Jugs ... Should be interesting ... don't know much about them apart from Royal Doulton made a lot of them.

Anyway .. I digress .... must work now!

My Nerves are Frayed

Why ?

I'm watching West Ham united try to hamg on in the premiership - not a likely scenario seeing as we need to win the last two games and Birmigham lose the last two plus Blackpool lose one too ... not really looking very good. It's half time though and West Ham surprisingly are 2-0 up away at Wigan and Birmigham are losing 1-0 at home to Fulham .. so far, so good though West Ham are probably the best side in the league at throwing things away!

Maybe I need to lay off the caffeine and get some Chamomile tea in. that might do it!

Oh well .. back to the torture pit !!!

And that just about sums up the season .. 2-0 up at half time and lose 3-2 .... David Gold's company incorporates Anne Summers and Knickerbox .. No wonder West Ham are pants !!!!!

Strange Old Day

It's funny; I thought I'd really enjoy my lie in yesterday, or should that be 'slob in'.

Things is though that it did nothing for me at all other than make me feel all restless and agitated all day ..felt pretty horrible and my brain felt scrambled. It probably didn't help that I didn't do any daimoku (buddhist chanting) at all which is unusual for me.

After watching the first half of the FA cup final and eating some rather nice asparagus with soft boiled eggs; I managed to drag myself outside and went into town to do a bit of basic shopping at Marks and Spencer, buying myself a nice curry for the evening.

Even that didn't go to plan though as I ended up going with a friend and her daughter to Wagamama'>Wagamama where I had my usual noodle dish. I remember the first time I went to Wagamama it was in London maybe 15 years ago and I think it was the only one then and the food was excellent. I know it has been franchised since but it really isn't that great now in my opinion .. or maybe I'm just eating the wrong things.

So that put paid to my Marks and Spencer Monkfish and Prawn curry of course and I just had a light snack whilst watching a French film which I realised I had seen before.

That and the football results pointing to relegation for West Ham didn't make for a good day.

And here I am again .. it's 10am and I still haven't got up, but you know what, today is going to be better and I AM going to get up now and do some daimoku to kick start the day.

Lying in Bed Thinking

It's been one of those mornings today

I had high hopes for the day, expecting some lovely sunshine, perhaps getting up for a relatively early morning walk.

But, you know what, it's nearly mid day and here I am, still lying in bed lazing around. I haven't even dragged myself out of bed to make my second cup of tea yet ... ahhhh tea, that great British institution.

Right ... now I actually have surfaced and made that ciup of tea and where am I now? .. Yes, back in bed, and it got me wondering and thinking about what a great thing beds are. Not so much when we go to sleep, let's face it, we can sleep almost anywhere, but that wonderful feeling, when we get the rare chance, just to lie around in our beds, reading, driniking cups of tea and generally relaxing.

I also find this to be quite a creative time when I write ,... maybe because I don't have a TV in the room to distract me perhaps.

But I have been awake for around four hours now, so perhaps I will finish this cup of tea and try to forget my bed for several more hours and actually go outside into the big bad world.

Local Elections and the AV vote

Well, it was nice to feel a little bit of hope again politically, even if only just.

GOOD night on the whole for Labour though dissapointing in Scotland obviously but good to see labour gains instead of sinking, though it would be even better to see Labour put at least some of the socialism back into the party !!

BAD night though for the lib dems and thoroughly deserved I feel ... let's be honest, no one likes to feel betrayed and I suspect that is how the vast majority of lib dem supporters must feel. There must be turmoil in the party as many supporters are more left leaning and more natural Labour than Tory allies and now, having taken such a kicking, there will inevitably be calls to leave the coalition ...how long can those calls be ignored?

GOOD night for the Greens too, being the largest party in Brighton and taking quite a few other key seats. I suspect not a party that could take power, but it would be great to see more MPs so that views can be heard and discussed at the very least.

BAD night for the BNP .. in a right financial mess and with few candidates, they lost most of the seats they were defending. A good thing for this country, though my main concern is that right wing supporters are increasingly leaving the 'political' agends and reverting to street politics as can be seen with the rise of the EDL

OK night for the Tories who more or less held their position, which for them given the current cuts, is a a good position ... However, the Lib Dems won't be such an effective punch bag next time around and most people will know someone close to them who will have been made redundant or lost their house or something so I hope they have their parachutes ready for the drop!!

BAD night for AV. I voted yes but increasingly as time went on, I wasn't bothered .. it was an incredibly poor alternative that had been put forward at the wrong time, poorly campaigned for and distracted from the local elections ... And all research shows it would have had little effect anyway.

Back to Work

So that's the Bank Holiday weekend over with then. Not that I really noticed the break being self employed, though I did manage to keep away from the work side of my PC for a few days which was nice.

Good to be back in the swing of things though and a busy week ahead, though I will definitely find time to make a few short trips to Trent Bridge.

The main news of the week of course, is the death of Osama Bin Laden, though I'm sure I'm not alone in suspecting it will make little or no difference to the risk of a terror attack.

I did feel the celebrations outside the Whitehouse were pretty distasteful though and reminds me of what would happen should public hanging ever be brought back!!!

Well , just a short post to keep me going with adding a page as often as I can, so it's back to work now, then don those sunglasses for a visit to Trent Bridge in an hour or so.

Royal Wedding! - What Royal Wedding

Thankfully, soon the memory of the Royal Wedding will fade from the nation's consciousness and we can get back to some semblance of normality.

Thankfully, I have to say, I managed to avoid the whole damn thing. To date, I have seen approximately 2 seconds of it and one photoshopped picture of the couple on the balcony in a certain sexual act.

Avoiding it was helped by a visit to Trent Bridge and an enthralling game of cricket which ebbed and flowed for days with both sides looking certain winners at various times.

Yesterday was then spent with my friend's daughter which is great fun but also reminds me of my own age .. especially the day after ... full of aching limbs today I'm afraid. Not that they will be tested too severely today I suspect.

As the alarm went off at 5.30am and I opened to the curtains to a potentially glorious day, I reminded myself that I will be stuck in a car for approximately 5 hours of the day and in meeting rooms for about 2 hours !! That said, it will all be good for my karma no doubt as the trip involves a visit to Taplow court, home of my Buddhist organisation SGI-UK.

Another benefit of today is that all being well, I'll be home in time to watch West Ham, hopefully start to pull themselves out of the relegation zone .. Now .. that's something to chant about!

Dreading the Wedding (The Royal Wedding that is).

As today is the last day of the Bank Holiday weekend, sights are already set on next Friday, the Royal Wedding. Well, some people's sights are set on the Royal wedding, but I suspect I'm not the only one whose sights are more set on the day off (and I probably won't be switching on the TV for the Royal wedding!).

Hopefully, Friday's day off will be a little more constructive than the bank holiday just gone. It's been a bit quiet but maybe that isn't a bad thing .. time to relax and sit in the sunshine .. shouldn't complain really should I !!

But next Friday will be day 4 of a county cricket game, so I suspect that is what I will be doing, though the game could well be over by then.

It will be interesting though to see if there really are street parties and celebrations for the Royal Wedding. The recent St George's day in Nottingham, seemed to really bring out only the fringes of British society .. those who refuse to believe that we aren't an empire any more and still rule the world. To be honest, it was a bit of a sorry sight and pales into insignificance some of the more colourful cultures celebrations ... If you had to sum up the St Georges day celebrations in a photograph, it would probably be of an overweight man sitting outside a pub drinking lager with a union jack tee shirt on with his drunken 'mrs' ... Good old England eh!!

Anyway .. I susppose I should really make the best of this last day off before the Royal Weddinmg and stop writing this and do something constructive.

A Middle Aged Saturday Night

Long gone seem to be the days when I'd get ready and head into town for a night out. It's not that I don't do that anymore - it's just that I tend to do it on weekdays when town is less full of vomiting youngsters.

To be fair, I don't feel unsafe or anything in Nottingham. Yes, it can be a little loud and macho but on the whole, and if you use half of your brain, it's easy to avoid any trouble.

So Saturday night is a staying in night now but that's fine ... It's been improved by the recent foreign import detective programmes on BBC4 I have to say. I'm now fully addicted to Wallender, the Killing and to a lesser degree, though still pretty good, Spiral.

So, time to take a soak in the bath, get some food on and chill out in frongt of BBC4 .. ah bliss

Every New Day

We all have our morning rituals and routines.

There was a time when mine revolved around jumping out of bed and eating breakfast before jumping on my bike and going on a training ride for 30 miles or so.

These days though, things are different; maybe partially because I stopped doing the above many years ago. Now, I start my day with a sip of water to wash down my blood pressure medication.

How did that happen to me? How did I end up with high blood pressure ... after all, I'm definitely not overweight .. in fact I'm only a wafer away from being underweight!

I had had a well man check up several years previous and was found to be all ok but the other year during a rain break at the cricket, I had one of those free blood pressure tests at a clinic situated at the ground. She found my blood pressure to be a little high but said there was no need to see a doctor for it .. but to mention it next time I went.

This turned out to be a couple of years later and I happened to mention what she had said so they decided to take my blood pressure and it was sky high ... 200/120 .. getting close to dangerous.

After a couple of weeks of getting more exercise and cutting out the crap in my diet, it had settled to somewhere around 160/100 which was better but not great.

It took several months of effort, healthy food etc for me to finally accept that I simply had high blood pressure and I was going to be on tablets for the rest of my life. Initially I was put on 2mg perindopril which had a small effect but after the dose was doubled to 4mg of perindopril, it finally started to come down and now averages around 120/75 which is good .... I must admit, I fought the idea of tablets, having always been healthy but I'm pleased I did now .. It's great not to worry that your blood vessels could blow any moment and it's not such a hardship having to swallow one tablet every morning really.

Thankfully, I didn't get the side effects some do apart from waking early which is annoying, though my circumstances have changed which make that not such a bad thing, but more about that another time.

My next battle is cholesterol .. apparently that is a little high .... so that's a work in progress .. I'll keep you posted.

Welcome to the blog

Welcome to my new blog where I will be discussing many things related to being middle aged.

No longer does this mean caravan holidays and cardigans as it seems to have done when my father was 'middle aged' . Middle aged now seems to start much later in life,probably somewhere around 50 although I know of many middle aged people who have significantly more energy than many a teenager!

So do I really welcome being middle aged? Well, yes and no .. Obviously, the older we get, the nearer to the big wind down and also things do start to ache a little more but on the plus side, all that teenage angst and worry? No thanks ....!!!

I sometimes think it would be nice to have the desire and energy to hurl myself into the middle of a mosh pit, but then I remember how enjoyable it is too, just to sit at a county cricket game, taking in the relaxing atmosphere or to listen to some jazz, without wondering if it's a cool thing to do or not.

On a Victor Meldrew note, it's also good to have reached that age when it's ok to moan about youngsters ... Only kidding .... maybe ;-)

So, here is my welcome ... I hope to post many articles here over the years.

Enjoy.