Tag Archives: sleep

Short Post

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I’m still out of it, but am progressing. Julia returned to work this morning, was soaked in the rain and returned home wet and totally worn out. She is in bed at the moment and I will wake her in a minute when I start to cook tea. I am going to do fishfingers, potato wedges and mushy peas – it seems like a good time for comfort food. I will do her some tomatoes too – she has been enjoying grilled tomatoes from our garden crop. Then we will have apple and pear crumble.

Squirrel looting bird table at Rufford Abbey

I am, meanwhile, just about cured. I’ve had a lazy day and read a few blogs. I needed the word “evolution” tonight but couldn’t bring it to mind. That’s Covid for you. I used “Darwinism” instead and eventually remembered “evolution”. The first time this happened was about fifteen years ago when I first had cellulitis and couldn’t speak properly in the few days as I recovered. My vocabulary seemed to disappear and I ended up having to explain many of the words I wanted to use. It was extremely frightening.

Bin raiding squirrel at Clitheroe Castle.

When I woke this afternoon I found that the postman had called and left a parcel from my sister – two bars of Green & Black’s chocolate. It’s organic, so it must be good for me. She included a note, it seems it’s a get well soon gift and she expects us to share it. Julia is already well so I’m not sure she qualifies for medicinal chocolate. I will have to give it some thought.

Pictures are grey squirrels. Tootlepedal had some in his blog today and it reminded me I had some.

Grey Squirrel

Missed a day – Ooops!

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I missed a day. Sorry about that. It would be nice to report that after leaving work on Saturday I became embroiled in writing and wasn’t able to find time to produce a blog post, but in fact I spent most of the time sleeping. I actually went to bed in the afternoon for about 4 hours. It was, I think, nature’s way of telling me to sleep more and get back to a sensible routine.

At the back of my mind I have an idea that I should be able to produce good work in the early hours of the morning when everything is quiet and there is nobody to disturb me. This was true at one time, but these days I tend to find that I don’t do anything worthwhile after midnight. All that happens is that after an hour or two of doing nothing useful I go to be, sleep badly and next day, find myself nodding off in the afternoon or evening.

At the moment I have three submissions to edit before sending them off, and two others to finish writing. I suppose that I can at least take pleasure from the fact that I have three ready. This is three more than I manged in either February or May, so it’s not all bad, even if it short of target. With two days to go I can still do a bit better, so I’ll get this finished and get to work.

Of course, as soon as I say that, the ideas stop. Julia just called me to remind me that we are going out tonight. We are going to a carvery. I had forgotten ll about it. If I’d remembered I would have cooked a smaller brunch.

Random photos, sorry, I have no inspiration. Two views of the red boat at Dunwich. One from last week, one from several years ago.

Red boat at Dunwich

Followed by Even Less Activity

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Last night, as I eventually drifted off to sleep after a day where nothing much happened, a brilliant idea for a post came to me. It really very good, and it justifies some research and a couple of well chosen category tags. This is the one, I feel sure is going to attract attention and make me rich and famous.

Just one snag. When I woke up this morning that was all I could remember. The actual subject and the brilliant opening sentence have all gone. This, as you may recall from previous posts, is typical of how it happens. I’m not, however, downhearted, as I have learnt to accept this as a fact of my writing life. Some of it may come back, but if not, something else will drift along to replace it.

The famous writer’s notebook? It was on the landing where I left it after coming upstairs. Not that it mattered as I can rarely read my nocturnal scribble anyway.

In my defence, it was very busy in my head last night and, like the famously overly full shelf, something must have fallen off the end.

I’ve been looking at the availability of short online courses. You may remember that I did a few several years ago. I got bogged down in one of them, and that was enough to stall my enthusiasm. It sounds pathetic, but sometimes that’s all it takes.It was, I see, February 2021, and the course was Exploring the English Language. It all got  little complicated, as I wasn’t taught formal grammar at school, and I ground to a halt.

I may go back to it, but I’m signed up for some Roman History at the moment, starting when I finish this post. If it goes OK I will look at doing further courses, even paying for them.

The ones I’m currently doing are Open University free courses.

The ones I’m looking at for later are Oxford University short courses. These are the distance learning ones where you have no specific study times and no live conversations.

None of it will lead anywhere, but as I’m 65 and have no long-term career goals, apart from living long enough to draw my pension, this will suit me.

My Orange Parker Pen

Thought for the Day

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I just looked up “Thought for the Day”, because I am, I confess, running dry. Not only am I having difficulty writing, I’m having difficulty finding an idea to write about. It was a disaster.

There are sites that offer you thoughts (though “thought” may be exaggerating the level of the material offered) – “be the rainbow to someone’s cloud” sticks in my mind. Apart from the false emotion it invokes, I’m not sure that clouds and rainbows are linked.

Then there is the discussion of Thought for the Day. I always used to listen to it in the morning, but gradually drifted out of the habit. I can’t tell you the last time I listened to it, and was surprised it was still on. I suppose this shows some sort of coarsening of my spiritual life.

We had a good result at work today. Someone in Malaysia, who obtained a  refund from us for two parcels which disappeared into the system after the Royal Mail cyber attack, got his parcels. He had them eight days ago, to be precise. Somehow, in all the excitement, he forgot to tell us and arrange payment.

Fortunately, I remembered to make one of my regular checks on missing parcels,  and we were able to remind him. We’ve had no word from him yet, but eBay, when informed, repaid us. There’s still time for them to change it (nothing is ever as simple as it seems with eBay) but it looks like we have solved that one.

They don’t all work out that well, but it’s nice to win one for a change.

The strange thing about this evening, is that I arrived home full of energy and enthusiasm for work. I really did. Unfortunately, it didn’t last. I’m going to have to work on keeping the enthusiasm going – part of it, I’m afraid, consists of not sitting in front of a TV quiz show as soon as I get home.

I tell myself that it sharpens my mind, but I’m afraid it also switches me off. After reading this article, I’m going to rethink my evening  activity. I say “activity” – this probably gives a wrong idea of the average evening, where my movement is often confined to walking to the kettle and several hours a night feature me falling asleep around 11.00 when I really should be going to bed.

Framework Knitters Museum – Manager’s Bedroom

The pictures? I looked up “sleep” and got the cat. Then I looked up “bed”. One reedbed, several “raised beds” and this . . .

There were no entries for “TV”, which is a start.

 

Two Mysteries

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The first is, how can I sleep so long? And how can I fall asleep in the middle of a TV programme I am interested in? I’m not sure about this, but after discussing it for more than 200 words I have come to the conclusion that it’s a mystery but it’s not very interesting, so I have edited heavily, using the “Delete” function. Old age and bad habits are probably at the root of things, so I will leave it at that.

The second mystery is my stats.Three days ago I had 41 views, 23 visitors, 15 likes and 12 comments. It’s about average. Obviously I would like to be more popular, but that might involve being nicer, or more interesting, and that’s not really my natural area.

Two days ago I managed 1,016 views, 24 visitors, 9 likes and 8 comments. That’s about average, apart from the views.

Things were moving back to normal by yesterday, with just 732 views (yes, “Just” 732 views – how soon I got used to fame and stratospheric numbers!) The blog had normal figures, with 15 visitors, 4 likes and 8 comments.

Then today, at 10.00, I have 317 views with 10 visitors, 2 likes and 9 comments.

I have a view on the Visitors, Likes and Comments figures – they are quite good for a blog that details the daily meanderings of a dull middle-aged man through modern life. Originally I had hoped for fame and fortune through blogging, but once it became clear that people want to read about food, handbags and the vacuous musings of “influencers” I resigned myself to a life of quiet mediocrity.

So there we have it. Not the greatest mystery in the world, but a mystery all the same.

For the erst of the day I will be occupying myself with medallions, poetry and snoozing in front of the TV. It’s not an exciting life, but it’s a niche that needs filling.

The picture is a clue to my puzzle-solving strategy.

 

 

 

Politics . . .

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Sorry, I fell asleep in front of the TV last night, woke just after midnight and decided to go to bed. I was upstairs when i remembered I hadn’t blogged or made Julia’s sandwich for lunch. Such was my desire to sleep that I resigned myself to the consequences and went to sleep. Fortunately she is very forgiving.

Yesterday was a strange day as I had to drive to Leeds to deliver empty boxes. Number One Son is moving to Norfolk at the end of the month and we have a large number of empty boxes (all flattened). It seems sensible to get as much use out of them as possible, though I’m not sure if the planet benefits from me driving that far just  to re-use cardboard boxes.

I’m currently watching the news. King Charles visited Wales today and several groups were demonstrating – variously supporting Welsh independence and republicanism.  They are entitled to their views. Whether they are showing themselves in a good light by shouting at a man who has just lost his mother is a different matter. One academic, speaking on the subject, referred to the “subjugation of Wales by the English monarchy”. That took place in 1283. I’m pretty sure Queen Elizabeth II didn’t do a great deal of subjugation. It might be time to let it go, after all,  I’ve forgiven the Romans, the Vikings and the Normans for invading us.

If you want an independent state you might be better entering politics than complaining about a 900 year old military defeat. I was about to mention I was thinking of starting a Mercian Independence Party, but I notice there are at least two organisations already devoted to restoring Mercian independence.. Before its subjugation by Wessex, Mercia had a fine history, including inventing the English penny and digging a ditch to separate itself from Wales. It also currently has a population around three times that of Wales, making it the 85th largest country in the world.

 

Day 205

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I’m a day behind again, but at 3am this morning, when I woke up in my chair I decided to go to bed. Normally I would write the blog,  make sandwiches and generally wake myself up. This time I just went to bed. Four hours later I was wrenched from my bed by a strange dream about a lack of toilet facilities. Do you ever get that one. I frequently do. I then wake up and realise the way out of my dream is to visit the toilet. One day, I suppose, I will wake up after dreaming that I found a toilet. At that point it will be time to move into a home.

The day was OK, and featured quite a decent rainstorm around mid-day, which cleaned the roads and made things a lot cooler.

Comma

Oh, and the computer broke. It went off and when I restarted it kept flashing “Fan Error”. We rang the man who does our computer stuff and he advised us to take the cover off and clean the dust off the fans. We could only find one fan, but we dusted it off and the computer worked again.

On the way home I tried the new roadworks. They were supposed to start on 1st August for a month (oh joy!) but seem to have started already. I tried an alternative route last week, just to see how it went, and that has a set of roadworks on it too. It wasn’t a total success as an alternative route. The normal route with additional roadworks wasn’t too bad, but traffic was light and I imagine it could get hot and unpleasant as the year goes on.

Small Copper

I’m not sure much happened apart from that. It has a tendency to be like that – a chat about Julia’s day, a little TV, a snooze, cook tea (we had pork steaks with roasted veg) and a bit more TV. I had more things planned but my head switched off, which takes us back to the first line.

Common Blue at Screveton

I thought I’d use some butterfly photos- I like butterflies but there have not been many about recently. It was hard finding them. I searched “butterfly” and only two photos came up, and one of them was a coin. Fortunately I realised that I must have titled them with the species, so was able to call more up.

 

 

 

Crepuscular rays at Rufford Park

Back to Normal

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Things are about back to normal now. I am still sticking to one sandwich for lunch and work seems OK, though I’m still having difficulty remembering where things are. This isn’t helped by the fact that the owner decided to “tidy up” while we were all off (he spent some of his isolation time working in the shop), Why he thinks that moving stock into random places without telling anybody is an improvement, I do not know. However, it’s his time he’s wasting, not mine.

My legs are still a bit weak after weeks of enforced rest but I am making progress on that.

I struggled to submit anything in September, but did manage a few things (mainly things that were already written and just needed tidying). I have three poems in Cattails this month – pages 86, 89 and 133 if you fancy a look.

I have also had acceptances from three other magazines (though only one will be available online) and will no doubt mention it again when it is published.

At one point, when I was really struggling to string words together, I actually thought I’d run to the end and would never write again. Fortunately that passed off after a week, as I don’t know what I’d do to replace it. At the moment I’m not writing much because I mainly work, eat, watch TV and go to bed early. I’m still sleeping off the Covid.

It is probably time to prepare a plan to make sure I spend my time wisely. However, for now I will just sleep.

 

 

Nothing Much of Note

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I nearly fell asleep at work today. In fact, if I’m accurate I did fall asleep several times, but only for seconds at a time.  No window, no ventilation and nothing to keep my interest (I was entering long lists of dull coins onto eBay) and the result was easy to foresee. I kept jerking into wakefulness and not quite knowing where I was in the process. This is not what they pay me for, so I should do better.

The first part of my evening was spent asleep in a chair and the second part was spent making and eating salad. It’s time to get back to a sensible diet. I have an appointment in a month’s time and my weight is likely to come up in the discussion. I would liken it to the elephant in the room, but that would merely emphasise my tendency to excess poundage. perhaps I should begin dressing in grey.

Very little of note has happened. I have organised a day off so that I can take Julia to a training course (Mencap seems to think everyone has a car and can travel 20 miles across country by 9am). That has been the only thing of note.

I’ve been loking at houses in Country Life on-line. It’s not a good thing to do. I note several of them have cinema rooms. I have enough problems staying awake in an armchair in the light. Put me in a cinema chair in the dark and no good will come of it . . .

A Mixed Day Trip

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Sorry, I’ve had a distinct lack of application over the last week. A lot of it is probably due to lack of sleep, followed by lack of focus. This leads to a lack of writing, and that will never do. I have written some bits but on a couple of occasions I have then fallen asleep at the computer and woken after midnight with 150 words done and nothing actually finished.

We went to the Yorkshire coast, finishing at Scarborough yesterday. Although it was open, and even crowded in places, there was a distinct lack of enthusiasm as couples with white knees exposed themselves to the weak Yorkshire sun and looked glum. I expect many of them wanted to be abroad.

Saltburn was pretty as ever, but full, as was Sandsend. We went round Whitby and called at the Botham bakery on the edge of town (the main tearoom only being open to people who book, and we hadn’t been organised enough. We had a pork pie to tide us over (it was getting a bit late by then) and bought pies and cake to eat during the week when we got home. We then drove down through then moors and had fish and chips on the front at Scarborough. They aren’t the best fish and chips, as I may have mentioned before, but it is probably one of the best sites for a chip shop I’ve ever eaten in – nestled under the cliffs and castle, and just yards from the sea.

A Botham Pork Pie – one of the best

Chips. A bit greasy, but generally OK

As I have probably said before, one of the main casualties of the virus is going to be spontaneity, as there’s a lot more booking to be done when visiting. I don’t know about you but when I’m away from work I like to relax. That means having a broad plan like “afternoon tea at Botham’s or “visit X”. It’s not about booking afternoon tea for 3.30 or visiting X by timed ticket ay 10.45.

If it had have been we would have been in trouble, because one of the engine management lights came on as we left home. The garage had a look at it for me and sorted within 20 minutes, but it was all time lost when we should have been travelling to the coast. It would not have been half as relaxing if I had had a timetable to keep to.It’s going to be  along time before I get the hang of relaxing again, as I found myself getting annoyed by the alck of distancing whilst queuing for the chips. Some people just ignored the flow system and the six foot rule, even though there are a lot of signs about. Yorkshire seems a lot more concerned about this than Nottingham for instance. A lot of the people who ignored the signs had kids with them – I can only assume they are happy to bring their kids up as selfish louts.

Home via the Humber Bridge