Tag Archives: forgetfulness

The Post That Never Was

Today’s post is going to be a politically scathing and hilarious look at modern life in the UK. Well, it was this morning when I composed it in my head as I drove to work. I seem to be able to relax and think in the car, which is quite an alarming thought when you think I am in charge of a ton and a half of metal powered by the equivalent of over 120 horses, all of which needs threading through a mass of vehicles driven by people paying even less attention than I do. I may have to reconsider my meditation routine.

Anyway, I won’t be writing that blog post. It’s partly because I’m trying not to do politics. And mainly because by the time I’d got to my computer (I email my notes to my home computer from the shop) I’d forgotten what I was going to write. I find I do that more and more often. I think my brains might have hit the point of no return. In terms of going over Niagara Falls in a barrel I’m at that teetering point just at then top, thinking of mortality and the long fall that is coming . . .

Meanwhile, today’s rant features charitable donations. I already give by standing order. I sometimes give a bit extra. I don’t mind the giving, what I mind is the way people like Amazon and eBay keep asking at check out time. If they want to support charity they can do it out of their massive tax-avoiding profits, not by ambushing me. And Clogau jewellery is even worse. I’ve ordered from them three times recently (I hve a lucky wife) and three times they have added £3.50 for a donation to a charity of their choice – twice for trees and once for something else I can’t remember. I always cancel the donation, but they shouldn’t have added it in the first place. It is very annoying as it makes me feel evil to cancel the donations. Anyway, I already give money to plant trees every year. End of rant.

Keyboard Induced Amnesia

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I think I have finally solved the problem of the mystery ailment that afflicts me every time I sit down at the keyboard – a strange forgetfulness that assails me as soon as my fingers touch the keys.

Take today, for instance. I entered the room with this post in mind, but still visited eBay, searched Ancestry for “Richard Badger” (he gave out a medal for the 1902 coronation, but there are to many to search) and had a look round a couple of houses for sale (one an old railway station in Yorkshire, one an ancient manor house in Devon _ I can’t afford either). That was after following a link to the bridge disaster in Great Yarmouth. I’ve lived in the Eastern Counties, I’ve visited Yarmouth several times, but I never knew there was a bridge collapse. Note – we call it Yarmouth because we’re lazy – it isn’t to be confused with the other one. The other one is a lot nicer by the look of the website and has never come in the top five of Britain’s Worst Seasides.

Whalebone Arch – Whitby

I just got diverted by the list – it’s not a very fair list and says more about the people who compiled it rather than the actual resorts. I’ve been to 9 of the bottom 20 and though they aren’t particularly nice places they aren’t horrible either, they are just resorts to go with your kids for an unsophisticated day out. They wouldn’t suit international jet-setters, lifestyle bloggers or readers of highbrow newspapers, but they are cheap, cheerful an inoffensive.

The top twenty? I’ve been to eight of them, and they are lovely. This, however, is an accident of geography and lack of development. How could you fail as a tourist resort if you have a beach and a castle? Or miles of beach and a scallop sculpture?

Fish and Chips from the Dolphin – Sutton on Sea

I can’t believe that Cleethorpes missed the bottom twenty, or that Llandudno didn’t make it into the top twenty.

Fish and Chips, that’s the thing to think of, and whether your kids will grow up with great memories of the day as they decide which Care Home you are going to.

Ooops, another diversion. I forgot what I was doing . . .

Boat trip at Llandudno

Day 129

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During the day I think of interesting things to talk about. During the evening, as I sit and watch TV, all my enthusiasm and knowledge seems to leak away. It happened tonight. I watched a programme about antiques, another which featured a fish & chip competition, one about auctions, one about gold-mining in Australia (it was cold and snowy in Victoria, which looked more like Canada), and a news quiz.

Next thing I knew, it was 1.30am and I had just woken up in my chair. I now have a headache and no desire to sleep. This is an unwanted state of affairs.

And I have clean forgotten what I intended to write.

Tomorrow I will blog as soon as I get home and try to make it more interesting.

We had a note from the man who was faced with a £1.50 penalty from the Post Office. The letter is properly stamped, with £3.05 of stamps. We know it is in the correct weight range, because we have other similar items and have check weighed them. It’s a mystery.

I have now dead-headed 57 Spanish poppy blooms and two Welsh poppies. This impressive, considering they are neglected ands growing from cracks between paving slabs.

I counted my poetry submissions last night. I have had about 80 poems published ( have mislaid an old list so am relying on memory for a few of these). It was just idle curiosity, bit now I know, I keep thinking about the magic 100. It’s not an important figure, just a convenient round figure, and it’s stuck in my head. I should be able to reach it by the end of the year, even though I know quantity and quality are two different things.

Addiction

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I had it in mind to write two posts today, but when I looked for my camera to download the photos, I found I’d left it at work yesterday. Not that it matters, they aren’t topical posts and they can wait.

Apart from that I’ve frittered my day away.

A goatlet, or whatever they call them. Never could stand the things, always escaping and looking at you with peculiar eyes…

I have submitted some work today, but apart from that haven’t made much progress in my plans to be one of the towering literary figures of the 21st century. This is a shame, as I woke up with such ambitious plans. I ended up washing dishes. cooking and watching quizzes. I think I may start telling myself that quizzes are coded messages from the devil. That way I might be able to stop watching them. On the other hand, you may read a post in a month’s time about how I made a pentagram in salt and sat in the middle of it to watch Pointless. In that case you will know that my addiction to quiz shows is becoming serious…

It’s strange. When I gave up smoking I had one packet of cigarettes in use and one unopened. I threw the partly used pack away and put the unopened pack by the front door. It was there for five or six years. It meant that I could have one if I wanted, and that seemed to make giving up a lot easier. I haven’t really given up smoking, even now, and still feel like a cigarette as I write this paragraph. People who give up smoking and bang on about their willpower and stuff, are really boring, and I don’t want to be one of them. I merely decided one day that I was going to delay my next cigarette. That was twenty years ago. I might have one tomorrow, but I might not.

If only I could do that with food and quiz shows. Unfortunately I can rarely pass a fridge or a TV set without checking what is in there.

Soda bread

Shots from the archives – March 2016.

Adventures in Amnesia

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I fell for what was possibly an internet scam website last night. There is no fool, it seems, like an old fool. My computer loaded it, despite its normal disinclination to load websites without security certificates, so I suppose it must have one. The address started with https, so I thought is was OK. It even had some convincing testimonials on it. But you would do wouldn’t you?

When I came to pay, it didn’t seem to work properly, so I contacted their helpdesk. The email was returned. I looked for a phone number or address but there were none.

At that point I realised that I may have paid money for nothing, and that I had given up my name, address and three digit security code to a stranger who possibly had felonious intentions aimed at my bank account.

Fortunately the bank was very helpful. They confirmed that no payments had been made and that nobody had tried to use the card. It looked like someone had just left a dead website floating in cyberspace. However, they were very helpful and cancelled my card just to be on the safe side. It will take four working days to get a new card and it is already becoming a nuisance that I can’t use my card. Without my card, for instance, I can’t book an online shopping slot.

They did assure me that lots of people get caught every day by things like this and said there was no need to feel bad about it. (I was at the time bemoaning the fact that my mental faculties had become so blunt that I would fall for something like this.

It was a bit like the time I forgot my PIN number. It had, at that time, been the same for 25 years. Then one day and as I stood at a cashpoint I realised that my mind was blank. I did not have a clue what my number was. I couldn’t even think of the first number.

They told me then that it happened to lots of people, but I think they might have been lying to make the old fool feel better.

I am beginning to hate these senior moments.

I even forgot the title once. I thought of it as I wrote, but by the time I’d scrolled to the top I’d forgotten it. Scrolled down again, and I remembered.

Thirty-Seven Minutes

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I completely forgot I was meant to go to a Numismatic Society meeting tonight. Then I missed the fact that the day was almost over. By the time I thought about it there were 37 minutes left. At least it made the title an easy choice.

It’s not the first time I’ve completely forgotten something important, but it’s always a worry when it happens. I was tired, I was worrying about something else and I just ran out of brain power. It was 11.00 before I remembered – four hours too late.

It’s 16 days to Christmas and I still have things to do. Time goes so fast!

On the other hand, there are only ninety days of winter left.

I’m going to leave it at that.

By the time I’ve found a photo it will nearly be midnight. I will then go to bed ans dream of parcels.

A Collectors World Parcel

New Day, Old Photos

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After being side-tracked by ebay I finally got round to adding the photos to yesterday’s post. Then I had the problem of letting people know that there were now photos on the post, as they are unlikely just go back on the off chance.

I was going to add them on this post and refer people back to the post. Unfortunately I forgot. As a result I’m writing this post to refer people back (in case they want to look at photos of disappointing snow and a woman fighting a bird feeder). So that people don’t feel I’m wasting their time I’m going to add a selection of photographs.

The featured image is the poppies made from plastic bottles. They are still going strong, despite four months in miserable weather.

Garden Gnome at Wilford, Notts

I thought the garden gnome was reasonably topical.

This memory problem isn’t an isolated one, I also forgot what my plans for tea were. Having agreed with Julia that I would make Welsh Rarebit, as we still weren’t hungry after our large breakfast, I went through to the kitchen, where the smell of cooking reminded me I’d put potatoes in to bake ready for…er…

I couldn’t actually remember what I’d been planning. Fortunately, baked potatoes and Welsh Rarebit seem to go together quite well, and with the addition of the remains of the gammon from last week passed for a meal. Don’t worry, we also had fruit to make it a bit more nutritious.

Puffin at Bempton Cliffs

I threw in a Puffin photo because everyone like Puffins.

Tomorrow I’ll be throwing some vegetables into Monday’s stew so we will be a bit healthier. I’m planning on a few lentils too. It should be virtuous, even if it isn’t good.

It’s quinoa salad tomorrow too. If it’s true what they say about grains and salad and vegetables I’m going to be positively bouncing with energy tomorrow and stacked to the earlobes with vitamins.

A Very Senior Moment

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Subtitle: An idiot and his phone are soon parted

I lost my phone today.

On the way back from the shop I thought of stopping off at the local Sainsbury’s and ringing Julia to see if she wanted anything taking back home. That was when I noticed that the pocket by my left knee was gaping open, instead of being zipped securely. I’d had a couple of phone calls in the

morning, and remembered putting my phone on the counter after I’d finished.

After that I had no memory of it, apart from having a vague thought that I mustn’t forget it as I packed my stuff.

I decided that the best course of action, as the Ring Road is always crowded at that time of day, was to carry on and go home. Once there I would ask Julia to ring, double check if the phone was concealed in my bag, and, if not, I would, talk to whoever answered and make suitable arrangements.

The other choice was to turn round and return to the shop in traffic, to see if I’d left the phone on the counter. That seemed like a lot of hassle when I wasn’t actually sure if I’d picked it up or not.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, I got home and looked through my bag. No phone.

Julia rang it (which was a welcome break from doing her tax and muttering at the computer) and it rang. I went through my bag again. I checked my camera case. No phone. We tried again. The ringing wasn’t coming from my bag. It was coming from my trousers.

For some reason I’d put it in a different pocket and it had, to all intents, disappeared. In terms of senior moments this is one up from entering a room and forgetting why.

Confusion, Rugby and Russia

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Took Julia to work this morning, tried to get the mowers started, was unsuccessful. That wasn’t the best start. Sadly, with this being a project run on a shoestring they rely on gifts, and nobody gives a good mower away.

Went to supermarket for cash, walked the length of the car park (that’s my “exercise” for the day) and, as I got to the machine, remembered my wallet was still at home. So I went home, scraped all my change together and rang a taxi.

As I walked into the hospital it suddenly struck me I didn’t have my phone with me. (This was solved when the lady at reception very kindly rang for a taxi at the end of my blood test).

Short wait, blood rest and good news at last. Well, mixed news, to be accurate. They have interfered with the natural functioning of my body to the extent that my blood now clots so slowly that I can no longer play rugby as the bruising could be fatal, and, like the Romanovs, I am likely to make a bad ruler of Russia. They achieve this by making you eat rat poison.

As I haven’t played rugby for years, and don’t like the idea of Russian winters this isn’t too bad.

The good news is that I can now go to the GP surgery for testing instead of the hospital, will eventually move to four tests a year instead of three a week, and I’m officially less likely to have a stroke.

On balance I’m prepared to give up rugby and Russia to lead a healthier life.

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Life after the Care Farm