This and that!

Jen sent me a quick message yesterday to say they'd made it to the gate and were on their way to the States (finally)! I picked them up at 8 a.m. on Sunday morning and they made it to Pittsburgh at 2.30 a.m. this morning (Wednesday) so a total of three days in the same clothes (nice), but at least they bought toiletries and other "essentials" at the airport before they left for the hotel. Then Jordan sent me a message this morning to say that their baggage had left on the original, Sunday afternoon flight. That's a huge no-no to have luggage travelling without its owners but what can I say! It was chaos and things happen but at least their luggage made it, even if it was 48 hours before they did. Told Jordan at least he has a clean change of boxers now!

Day 3 of being on the road!

I was talking to my sister yesterday about their travel saga and about the new flooding in the Hereford/Worcester area (near where we grew up). It floods in that area pretty much every year because of the large rivers, but I understand this time it is the worst flooding on record! While obviously people's homes getting flooded is much more devastating, it just breaks my heart to hear of some of the beautiful, historic buildings being damaged also. And totally irrelevant to anyone's safety or livelihood, she told me that the old Miners' Bridge in Betws-y-Coed (the village where my mom grew up) had been washed away!! This bridge was built many hundreds of years ago and was used by miners ferrying stone from the quarry in the woods, hence its name. Like I say, it had no real "value" except as a tourist attraction but we were both saying how sorry we were to see it gone as it was such a magical spot with great memories of where we used to play as kids when we stayed with family in North Wales.

The Black and White Museum, Hereford

Miners' Bridge, Betws-y-Coed

Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, on Sunday, after I dropped the kids off at the airport, I met up with my friend for a coffee. Municipal elections will be taking place here in a couple of weeks so different parties were handing out flyers outside the coffee shop. When the guy offered me a flyer I just said no thank you (in French) and then he said something back in English. So ole Dutchy says words to the effect that "we speak French, what's your problem?" (ok, maybe not quite as rude as that but you get the gist) and I was furious with him. "Why do you have to be so rude"? Well actually he knows it irritates me and sometimes does this kind of thing to wind me up. But he said that people switching languages on him drives him nuts, even to the point that sometimes when he goes to Holland he will speak in Dutch (of course) and it really irritates him when they reply in English. So I said maybe they just want to practice their English, but he would have none of it. Then inside the coffee shop there was an incident with an old guy who brought his dog into the café and the waitress asked him twice to take it outside as dogs were not allowed. So Dutchy makes some comment and there were a couple of small "digs" going back and forth between Dutchy and the dog owner and I just hate it! In the end I told him that what really annoys me is that his English is so perfect and his accent so bloody posh that everyone thinks he's English and we get the blame for being miserable sods when it's nothing to do with us! And with that he just laughed at me (the sod)!

Which brings me back to another gem many moons ago. We had taken the kids on a fairly last-minute trip to Cyprus at Easter one year and my ex and I got friendly with a British-Indian couple called Jaz and Mandy. One night they were having a karaoke session in the hotel (oh horror of horrors), and this British couple got up to sing "The Only Way Is Up" - or at least I think that's what it was. I couldn't be sure though because they were terrible! Totally out of tune and everyone was either roaring laughing at them or egging them on. And they looked so British too - you know, the guy in the string vest, shorts, brown socks (seriously) and sandals. They were just excruciating. Jaz looked at me at one point and said "are you just wishing the ground would swallow you up too?" and I just nodded. But the soul-destroying thing about the whole event (as we found out afterwards) was that those embarrassing "Brits" turned out to be Kiwis, and short of running round with a foghorn shouting "they're not Brits, they're Kiwis" Jaz and I couldn't see any other way around taking the blame for being embarrassing Brits abroad - so we decided to head off to the bar to drown out our abject humiliation! That sorta worked!

The Brits abroad - note the socks and the hanky!

This one I'm happy to claim - Mr. Bean - comedy genius!

And finally, yesterday would have been my dad's 100th birthday had he lived that long. When someone is in their 90s, for me at least, it's still somehow real, but thinking that dad would have been 100 just blows my mind. My sister said the same thing. Gosh they lived to see some things in their lifetimes didn't they!

The family - late 1950s/early 1960s - I'm the babe in arms!

Ted (dad) as a young man!

My wedding. Dad didn't quite make it to 100 and my marriage didn't quite make it to 30 years but hey ho!