Our New Life in Devon

 I'm pleased to say that our dogs have made a complete recovery and are now both back to normal. I did go to South Gloucestershire with the dogs and OH to look after granddaughter for our daughter's Xmas work night out. Granddaughter was very well behaved, as she always is with us. We dropped of Xmas presents for our eldest son, daughter-in-law and the 2 eldest grandchildren on the way home. Our nephew and son (Mark) both arrived on Friday evening. Our daughter and youngest grandchild arrived Saturday, so we were pretty full over the weekend. Nephew left yesterday, Monday, as he has work on Tuesday. We all had our huge Xmas dinner before he left which was cooked by our daughter this year. Xmas table cloth, crackers, and wine were on the table so it looked really festive. We always have a Xmas meal before Xmas, never on Xmas Day. We never have a roast meal on Sundays either, like many people in the UK. OH made it a rule, when we first got married, that he didn't want Sundays...

 Well, where do I start with this? OH took our 2 dogs to the beach with Mark, our son, last Friday. They called in a pub on the way back home, and an elderly man took a bag out of his pocket and gave them CHICKEN!! OH thought it was going to be a biscuit but the dogs had already eaten it before he could stop them! Both dogs have been very ill since then with upset stomachs. To make matters worse we were needed to stay at DDs home to take delivery of a parcel Monday morning, and I had a relative's birthday Tuesday and a dental appointment. Daughter still needed us to come as DPD had refused to arrange a delivery time except Monday all day. They even told her if nobody was home it would be returned and she could buy it in a shop at full price! It was a very difficult few days, with OH sleeping on an airbed on the kitchen floor so he could let the dogs out in the night, and undertake cleaning the floor. One dog has now improved but the other we took to our old South Gloucestershire ve...

 Well the cough got so much worse so I had to go to the GP this week. Phoned at lunchtime and was seen just after 5pm, and sadly I'm back on antibiotics and the dreaded steroids again. Antibiotics affect my ability to think straight - they always have I don't know why. Definitely can't drive on them. Steroids make some of my hair fall out in about 5 or 6 weeks time. It's a known side effect of them and it does grow back again eventually. I had to go as I was coughing all night so no sleep for me or OH, who started sleeping on the sofa after the 3rd night lol. The weather here today is torrential rain, and very windy all day, so I'm having a pyjama day chilling at home. I actually wear a track suit, not proper pyjamas. I think they call it lounge wear lol. OH and son took the dogs to the beach, which they loved. They normally hate the rain unless it's on the beach, which is strange but true 😆  I felt much better yesterday so walked to the U3A meeting for the mon...

 Last weekend we went to Trago Mills near Bovey Tracey, which is a huge department complex. OH bought himself a warm padded coat, and I've made a good start on the Christmas shopping. I bought wrapping paper, Xmas serviettes, cards for close family and friends, Christmas crackers, and liquer chocolates. OH called in Sainsburys and picked up some tubs of chocolates for the adult children, and I have already bought tins of shortcake biscuits for them. We just give money to our sons, and the 2 eldest grandchildren. Daughter-in-law gets a gift card and box of chocolates. A bottle of spirits each is always welcomed. I don't buy them gifts as I never know what they would like anyway. So it's alcohol, chocolates, biscuits and cash which is what I know they like. Our daughter is a bit different....... She likes presents so sends me a list usually, as does the youngest grandchild. This makes it so much easier for us at Christmas as we only have to buy presents 🎁 for 2. OH and I don...

 It's official! I actually dread updating my phone. Why, you may ask? Well it messes up everything that I've already set like staying logged in to Google, or even preventing me to log in unless I do it several times. Logging me out of various other sites I'm on. I'm unable to get predictive text on 3 different sites, and all day today I'm anonymous on my own blog. That has now been rectified as of 10 minutes ago. Did I do anything to help it. No, it just magically decided to recognise me again. Google sends me an email each time I log in marked security alert, so that's more work deleting unwanted emails It's quite difficult for me to decipher passwords as although they are stored on my phone they are in code and heavily abbreviated. But that will change..... Martin Lewis made a very good suggestion a few months ago. He advised keeping all passwords in a book somewhere. His reasoning was: it's more likely that you will loose your phone, or have it stolen...

 The weather here has been raining almost every day for what seems like weeks now. I was sat here thinking how nice it would be to go abroad to somewhere dry and warm for a week or 2. However, looking at the news I can see Spain has had torrential downpours, Sicily was flooded with pictures of cars floating in car parks, and Tenerife has huge waves and torrential rain. I've been to a few of the Canary Islands years ago and visited Lanzaroti while working for a disabled couple as their personal assistant -  or caregiver if you're reading from USA. Floods in Sicily  credit to Manchester evening news When I left social work I took a temporary job with an agency as a visiting home carer. Following this I then decided to look for something more permanent and went to an interview for a Personal Assistant to the disabled couple. At the interview the job was described as cooking breakfast,  helping the paralysed person to shower and dress, doing some laundry, light housework...