Monday, March 12, 2007
Life is what happens whilst your busy making other plans
Its scary that it is already the middle of March and I hav'nt posted anything in 3 months. After the excitement of the Billy Bragg gig, the rest of December was spent preparing for Christmas. Christmas 2006 was unusual. I normally work until very close to the day itself, if not on Christmas day, so arranging the things needed for Christmas has to be fitted around everything else that goes with being a family. However, this year was very different for me, as I had to use up a large amount of annual leave before starting a new job as a school nurse. This meant that I finished my sickness in early December, but my first day was the third of January!
It was a good thing I had all that time off, as my wife works for a firm of accountants, and December is normally a very difficult time for her. She works an enormous amount of overtime between October and Christmas, and I have to try and do her jobs at home as well as my own. At least this year i didn't have to work, as the "busy season" started in the middle of October, and she was working 7 days a week just to keep up. It is never easy and she was very, very tired by the time Christmas came.
There is normally a grand order of all the presents needed in October, which is now much easier thanks to the internet. A day long tread around our local shopping center has been replaced by an hour or two spent ordering on websites. We normally use Amazon, but also order using other websites such as Tesco and Woolworths. The latter has a great facility of allowing you to collect online orders from a store so you don't have to wait in for a delivery man.
We had Christmas at home, inviting my mother to join us. We then dropped her home on Boxing day, taking two cars to her house, and then traveling up to the northeast to see my wife's family.
There is a grand gathering of the clan every Boxing Day. About 50 people sit down to Boxing day tea, party games and Christmas carols. Its a great day and a good chance to catch up with what's going on in the rest of the family. We stayed until New Years Eve at my sister in law's.
And then home to a new year and a new job.... but that's a story for another day!
It was a good thing I had all that time off, as my wife works for a firm of accountants, and December is normally a very difficult time for her. She works an enormous amount of overtime between October and Christmas, and I have to try and do her jobs at home as well as my own. At least this year i didn't have to work, as the "busy season" started in the middle of October, and she was working 7 days a week just to keep up. It is never easy and she was very, very tired by the time Christmas came.
There is normally a grand order of all the presents needed in October, which is now much easier thanks to the internet. A day long tread around our local shopping center has been replaced by an hour or two spent ordering on websites. We normally use Amazon, but also order using other websites such as Tesco and Woolworths. The latter has a great facility of allowing you to collect online orders from a store so you don't have to wait in for a delivery man.
We had Christmas at home, inviting my mother to join us. We then dropped her home on Boxing day, taking two cars to her house, and then traveling up to the northeast to see my wife's family.
There is a grand gathering of the clan every Boxing Day. About 50 people sit down to Boxing day tea, party games and Christmas carols. Its a great day and a good chance to catch up with what's going on in the rest of the family. We stayed until New Years Eve at my sister in law's.
And then home to a new year and a new job.... but that's a story for another day!
Labels: Christmas, church, online shops
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Is it that long?
I have always enjoyed reading accounts of peoples lives and their blogs. Here is my bottle thrown into the digital cyber ocean.
I have contributed to the one day in history blog, which is a project to create the biggest blog in history for the use of future historians and as a record of life in Britain in 2006 (for further details see http://www.historymatters.org.uk/output/page96.asp) but have repeated it here for my own blog.
I noted that I havent posted anything since July, where does the time go? In my case in the normal everyday round of work, family church and stuff.
Today was an unusual day as I have been signed of sick for 4 weeks with stress. I have had medication which has helped. I am trying to avoid taking any medication, but managing it myself with relaxation, guided thoughts and prayer. There is no one big reason why I am feeling like this, just a chronic buildup of stress at home and at work. I am planning to spend my time relaxing and catching up on all the things that you usually don't have time for, like writing something in my blog.....
So instead of going to work I went driving around doing jobs, went to a first appointment with my counselor. I collected a match ticket for my team Aston Villa, delivered it to a friend, and then treated myself to a fantastic sandwich from the best sandwich shop in Birmingham called Phipott's. I had a coronation chicken sandwich and a prawn and avacado wrap, ate half of each and saved the rest for today.
Then did some housework and spent time with the family. Dropped my daughter off at a church children's group and then went to a prayer meeting. My faith is very important to me and is really helping at the moment. A small group of us meet together monthly to pray for two particular people involved in missionary work The group has developed into a support mechanism for the people involved and we have seen prayers answered and God moving in a mighty way
Bed at about 1130 without any sleeping pills which was good
I have contributed to the one day in history blog, which is a project to create the biggest blog in history for the use of future historians and as a record of life in Britain in 2006 (for further details see http://www.historymatters.org.uk/output/page96.asp) but have repeated it here for my own blog.
I noted that I havent posted anything since July, where does the time go? In my case in the normal everyday round of work, family church and stuff.
Today was an unusual day as I have been signed of sick for 4 weeks with stress. I have had medication which has helped. I am trying to avoid taking any medication, but managing it myself with relaxation, guided thoughts and prayer. There is no one big reason why I am feeling like this, just a chronic buildup of stress at home and at work. I am planning to spend my time relaxing and catching up on all the things that you usually don't have time for, like writing something in my blog.....
So instead of going to work I went driving around doing jobs, went to a first appointment with my counselor. I collected a match ticket for my team Aston Villa, delivered it to a friend, and then treated myself to a fantastic sandwich from the best sandwich shop in Birmingham called Phipott's. I had a coronation chicken sandwich and a prawn and avacado wrap, ate half of each and saved the rest for today.
Then did some housework and spent time with the family. Dropped my daughter off at a church children's group and then went to a prayer meeting. My faith is very important to me and is really helping at the moment. A small group of us meet together monthly to pray for two particular people involved in missionary work The group has developed into a support mechanism for the people involved and we have seen prayers answered and God moving in a mighty way
Bed at about 1130 without any sleeping pills which was good
Labels: anxiety, aston villa, blog, church
