A PERFECT STORM.. PART 3. LIVING IN ISOLATION!

Well, she's not really in isolation because I'm here but we are not allowed visitors and if she goes out, she has to wear a scarf a la Hepburn, dark glasses and have every inch of herself covered up!

One day when she had to go to see her doctor, her own mother would not have recognised her! It was a bitterly cold day, so she put on a wig, they keep your head warm, added a scarf and dark glasses and went out.

The receptionist recognised her voice, squealed with laughter and said "what a disguise, I'd love to see Dr. William's face when you go into his room" and buzzed her through to the staircase. Well, he loved it and chuckled.

Today there's doom and gloom about a weather front that is, apparently hitting the UK. I write 'apparently' because there are photos of rain soaked streets in London, besides other places, but it is all most curious..

For, on our steps, there is not a drop of rain water to be seen. They're as dry as baked bone and bones are what I want to tell you about.. 

For she received a gift yesterday which make her cry.. she works as a volunteer for a charity shop in Fulham.. where she'll go back when she is given the 'all clear' by Moorfields.

One of the volunteers and she were talking about food, stews in particular, as you do when you have a great butcher and a brilliant fruit and vegetable market right outside the shop door!

They said that they bought trays of bones from Dickinsons, the butcher and she remarked that she roasted bones before using them in a stew. 

"Wow.. I have never thought of doing that and it makes perfect sense, doesn't it?" said her colleague.

The night before last, we were tucked up and watching a lovely dvd when we heard someone shutting the top gate but thought nothing of it until she received a text from that colleague saying that they were all sad to have heard about her not being well and that there was a 'little' something on her doorstep.

Hmm, she thought, how nice and pottered off to investigate what it could be. 

'WHAT!! NO.. I can't believe it!' But yes, she had better believe it, her sweet colleague had been to their butcher and bought her a bag of lamb bones!

A wonderful mix of end of neck (her favourite cut for lamb stew), chops bones and ribs.

If you have a PROPER butcher, who doesn't just buy his meat in already cut, they should have bones that are wonderful for: stews, soups and stock. 

Our butcher sells a well laden tray for £1.00 and you had better get there early if you want any for the good folk of Fulham are not stupid!

So, yesterday afternoon, she divided the bones into two, turned on the oven and slid a large roasting tray into the oven to cook for 90 minutes at a medium heat. 

She had seasoned the bones with a mix of herbs, salt and pepper, (one of her favourite from The Spice Maker) but added no oil, for the fat from the lamb would render down in the heat and stop the meat drying out.

Her eyesight might be dodgy, her hearing certainly is certainly but there is nothing the matter with her (or my) sense of smell! 

After 90 minutes, the fat had melted, the meat was cooked and the bones had started to break down.

The same was done with the remaining bones, then the trays were put aside and when we went to bed, the bones had cooled and the fat hardened.

Today she'll take a huge casserole and will fry, until they are soft but not browned, onions, garlic and tiny amounts of ginger and turmeric root.

She'll add and fry a mix of herbs, spices and brown and yellow lentils. Add a good amount of water, bring the pan to the boil and then drop the heat down to a simmer. 

After a good hour and having kept a careful eye on the liquid level, she'll add the bones, carrots and top up the water so they're covered and it will sit on a back burner for a long time.

You cannot rush a good stew and as you cannot put a pan of this size into the chilly white larder, aka fridge, it will live on the stove and be brought to the boil once a day.

It will be delicious, you can use barley but she cannot as barley contains gluten to which she is highly allergic, her right hand finger joints swell, both knees become painful and vicious hives break out all over her body. 

When she showed a particularly bad attack to her doctor, his mouth opened, he gulped and then called in the senior partner of the practice to see them. 

Who grimaced and said "And ignorant people poo-hoo food allergies and the devastating effects of those horrifying chemicals they use on non-organic farms, I know you use homeopathic medicine, which remedy are you using to counteract these hives?"

So, dear reader, you are now up to date.. she has to get some yumyum organised for our lunch and then she'll 'do the stew'.

We hope that you're happy and healthy wherever you are and if you're not, then if you can do something about it pretty quickly, do so, for life is too short to be wasted.

GeeGee Parrot.
November 7th, 2018.
PostScript: The Spice Maker. (44) 01689 897677

They sell brilliant herbs and spices in grinders, 2 sizes and everything that you could possibly want for decorating cakes! We have posted about them before and will, undoubtedly, do again.. She loves their products and their prices! 

Tell them you read about them on GeeGee's blog. 

A PERFECT STORM.. PART 2. HOW IT UNFOLDED.

Ok, where was I? Ah yes, we went to stay for two days with friends in their glorious house up in the hills above Streatham.

We caught a bus to Streatham Hill, then another which took us up Leigham Court Road, where we got off and met Roy, who drove us to their house.

The weather was glorious, her bed comfy, the food magnificent and Ann and Roy had no objections to me sitting (very quietly) on the dining table at meal times.

She had gifted Ann two days gardening work for her birthday. The first day, she tackled their very big terrace. She weeded and cleaned it and then did the same to the paths which lead up to the top of the garden where the vegetable patch is.

The next day she worked on the large vegetable patch and tackled two large 'hot box' compost bins.

The contents had stuck half way so nothing was dropping down, compost must have a ratio of green and carbon in order for it to decompose properly and there were far too many grass cuttings in both boxes.

Dirty.. Messy unpleasant work but as both her hosts are over 75 years old and not up to doing this kind of work, she raked out what compost had been made from the bottom and sorted it out from the top. 

Jobs done.. 

She got a massive hug from Ann and a lift from Roy back down onto Streatham Hill where we caught a 137 bus to take us home.

That was on Thursday October 11th, on Friday, she went to the library and did grocery shopping and called into see our Lebanese friends.

Then all hell broke loose!

For she awoke on Saturday with an incredibly sore neck and throat, her hearing was non-existent, she was running a temperature and her ears were blocked and her sinuses were.. ohhh.. so painful.

Ginger, garlic, cloves (and sesame oil) were brought in to 'play', they are anti: bacterial, inflammatory and viral and any thoughts of gardening were banished.

Luckily she had done the food shopping and had plenty of fruit and bird food, she had caught 'the mother & father' of a cold (or so she thought) and put herself back into bed with another quilt on top to keep herself  warm.

Sunday more of the above

Monday. Having spent a gruesome night with a high temperature and chills.. she woke up at about 7am and had a major panic attack. Her eye lids were stuck together!

She felt her way down the hall and into the bathroom where she soaked both eyes with water until the 'glue' was washed away.. to find.. oh no!

Oh yes.. both eyes were covered in what looked like thick creamy white string.. very scary.

Action stations.. wash, dress, put fresh food and water out for me and out of the door to catch a bus to Moorfields A&E, she had the sense to take her Moorfields hospital number with her, her vision was dreadful so she didn't feel safe enough to go by tube.

She followed the 'green' line down City Road.. lucky are those who don't know what this means.

And went into reception at A&E, she was wearing dark glasses as the string had formed over both eyes and it was both hideous and scary.

"How can I help you" said the pleasant woman behind the desk, she said "Here's my hospital number, I'm a patient here and this is the problem" and with that, she took off her glasses.

I won't write what the woman said.. too rude but she literally sprang into action, she gave the hospital card to another colleague and said "access her file asap, I'm taking her into isolation, come with me" and she led mama, who had her glasses back on, past an astonished bunch of people and off into a corridor where she had never been before.

"Sit here and rest, someone will be with you as soon as we get your file down from records" and she closed the door.

In a very short time, a charming doctor was with her and asked to see her eyes.. he was angelic. He took her into another room and cleansed her eyes, asked her for the sequence of events which had led up to this and then examined her eyes.

"You have contracted several different serious complaints, you have both severe viral conjunctivitis with pseudo-membranes and you have picked up an infection" explained Dr. George, "I am just going to get someone else to examine your eyes" and he left to come back with a pretty and smiley woman who introduced herself as Emma.

Much cleaning of hands went on, then she looked at mama's sore eyes. "Ok, 2 drops into each eye, wait 1 minute, then use forceps George", she then explained that pseudomembranes are like fish scales that attach themselves to the eye ball and if left untreated, would cause her to lose her sight.

It didn't hurt but it was mighty scary.. just the mere thought of those fishy scales being peeled off your eye ball is scary in itself.. let alone seeing the forceps coming at you!

Emma returned with a prescription, "You must follow these instructions to the letter, for the first week, you take 1 drop every 2 hours, then every 4 and so on for 7 weeks, I've made you a follow-up appointment on Wednesday at 11am. You mustn't socialise with people, keep your head and throat warm, bed rest is essential, keep on taking the ginger and other herbs. IF, you have to go out, you must wrap up warmly. Please eat lots of fruit and drink a lot of water and hot ginger tea. We'll notify your GP by email of what we have found, now go home to bed and we will see you on Wednesday", she bent down and kissed mama on the top of her head and said "Don't worry, we'll sort it out, thank goodness you came in and didn't just think it was because of your cold". 

So there you are folks or rather here we are, she's down to 3 drops a day, so slowly. very slowly, she is getting there, the creepy white string is now just a hideous memory but she did send a photo of her eyes when they were at their worst to her surgery.

Who have been angelic, they called her the moment they received the email from Moorfields and discussed it with her. 

They've made an appointment with audiology for a hearing test at the end of November and a friend took her hearing aids to be checked and collected her new prescription long and short distance glasses.

Most of the time she has slept, I've plucked my tummy and nibbled my shoulders again.. yes, it had all grown back but now I look as if moths have been at me. Because this is horrid.. I'm not used to mama just lying there.. 

Emma was certain that she'd had a cold brewing when she was in Streatham and that combined with a bacteria which had been in one of the compost bins, she had created the perfect storm.

GeeGee Parrot.
November 6th, 2018.
PostScript: If you are cleaning or clearing out an old compost bin, wear goggles and a mask. The bacteria that break down food waste and plant waste are extremely powerful and you do not want to breath them in or get them in your eyes. 

A PERFECT STORM.. PART 1. THE BEGINNING.

'Tra-la-la' she thought.. 'what could be nicer than a jaunt with Juliano and Andreea to see Amanda's new house?' So having kissed Beaky, she sped off to Philbeach Gardens to meet them and to set off for Black Horse Road.

Andreea squeeezed - she's pregnant with Amelia and Lukas - behind the wheel and off they went. She had her mouth open within 20 minutes at the sight of the new (to her) Westfield and all the building works taking place behind the Holland Park area.

Zoom zoom.. no traffic om the roads and they made such good time that they pulled off into a huge shopping area and Juliano slipped out to them buy coffee and edible treats. Having 'wasted' quarter of an hour, they drove to meet Amanda at her new house.

Juliano, who is in charge of the refurbishment of the house, opened the door and in they went. Both Andreea and mum's eyes rolled about a bit as they explored this - extremely - weird dwelling. "What an extraordinary layout" they both remarked and she went through the kitchen, the only decent room in the house, out into the garden.

Which was why mum was there, she was to give Amanda ideas of what she would do if she decided to take on the job of making a garden for her.

Dear Readers.. if I say it was a complete nightmare, I am not exaggerating! The courtyard, which is what it is, measured 7 metres - 22 or so feet - across by 10 metres - 33 or so feet deep BUT the entire surface was covered to the depth of 30 cms - a foot - at least with large stones. Not pebbles.. stones!

The walls were tall panels of cheap fencing topped with arched metal posts which supported a fine mesh and curved inwards. 'Curious, no, not curious, absolutely extraordinary' she thought and went inside as it had started to rain.

Amanda arrived and they went back out and looked at the area, the side passage and into the poor broken down outhouse at the end of the garden and spoke of what mum would create and how she would achieve it. And then Amanda dropped her bombshell.

"That sounds absolutely lovely and I would love that if the garden were for me, but it's not, I have 13 rescue cats and a dog and the area is actually for them and I will be putting down covered litter trays out here and the outhouse will be for them if it gets too hot or if it rains during the day when I'm out at work or at university".

It was, excuse my French, pissing with rain, the temperature had dropped below 10 degrees and she was, frankly, more than a trifle pissed off at being asked to come and look at something that didn't require any input from her whatsoever!

GRRR.

So she smiled at Amanda, for whose father she would walk over hot coals in bare feet and said "Sweetie, you don't need me at all. What you do need is to call a rubbish clearance team and get them to take away the stones, then Juliano and his team will be able to get in to the outhouse safely, they'll replace the roof, make good the walls and flooring and put in a proper window, job done. The floor of the courtyard is concrete so nothing has to be changed there, the garden gate to the street has to be strengthened and made burglar proof and you will have to extend the cat security fencing all the way along that fence and over the gate".

And she walked back into the kitchen where Andreea looked at her and who then 'waddled' off to speak to Juliano.

Within a few minutes Juliano appeared carrying a monster box of tools and said "Ok Amanda, the first refurbishment phase is finished, call me when you are ready for me to start on the next phase. We're leaving now I have to get Andreea home as she is cold" and with that he scooped up Andreea and mum, opened their car, packed them in and off they went.

Andreea turned a few corners and stopped.. she hit the wheel and ranted "What the hell was that for? Why did she ask you to come over here to design a garden when it's going to be a cats' lavatory!" and they roared with laughter.

They dropped her off at her house and she ran down the steps and into the flat.. brrr.. she was so cold and her jacket was soaked. Kettle and soup were both heated.. she had a shower, got into her PJ's and jumped into bed.

The next day was glorious, sunny and warm and we had three friends to lunch on the allotments!

Monday arrived.. also dry and sunny, she had a very sore niggly patch on the inside of either side of her throat just below her ears. She gargled with salt water, brushed her tongue with a squirt of tincture of Myrrh and went about her business.. which was to gather me up again and head out to the allotments.

The next day in the afternoon, she packed a backpack with things for a 2 day stay away, gathered me up but this time we were off to visit friends in their lovely house way up above Streatham Hill.

This is a two part post.. so come back later to read the second part.. pippip.

GeeGee Parrot.
October 20th, 2018. 

EASYLIFE TELEPHONED HER TODAY & OFFERED HER A £10 FUEL VOUCHER. I WONDER WHY? WOULD IT HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH THE FACT SHE HAS BLOGGED ABOUT THEIR APPALLING CUSTOMER SERVICE? SURELY NOT.. BECAUSE THAT SOUNDS VERY LIKE A ... WHY DO YOU THINK THEY DID THAT?

She is very deaf at the moment as she has a head cold, sinusitis and is not very well, in fact, she's in isolation as she also has a severe eye infection and is putting drops into her eyes every two hours.

So when a woman telephoned at midday demanding to know who she was, she got the rough side of my mum's tongue and was told in no uncertain terms that the caller better identify herself otherwise this call was being terminated immediately.

She identified herself as being a representative from the EasyLife Group and said that they wanted to know if she would accept a £10.00 fuel voucher and that this call was being recorded.

You know God doesn't always give you these opportunities to say wondrous things - especially on a recorded telephone line but HE certainly gave her the goodies today.

She grinned a wolf-like grin and said to this strange woman "No, I don't want a £10.00 fuel voucher from the EasyLife Group, I am a pensioner, I don't run a car, I use buses. Goodbye" and hung up.

Ah.. EasyLife, how silly you were to think you could 'get' to my mum with £10.00.. very silly because now there's another post floating about on the web but this time with how they tried to 'give' her money.

Sorry that we haven't posted for ages, she was incredibly busy at the allotment, then she caught a chill which swiftly turned itself into an evil head cold and then she contracted this monster of an eye infection. The photo taken of her is beyond scary, her eyes are covered in white string like pus.. it's a terrifying sight.

She off to sleep, I will doze on a cupboard door. She'll get better, we will post again but when.. I don't know.


GeeGee Parrot.
October 18th, 2018.
PostScript: The EasyLife Group took her money but failed for three weeks to deliver the goods. They never did arrive and then it took over two weeks to get her money back. 

BRIGGS & STRATTON.. NOW HERE'S A TALE OF AN AMAZING MACHINE BUILT BY THIS GREAT COMPANY.

In the summer of 2003 she purchased a lawn mower, the chassis was by Mountfields and the engine by Briggs & Stratton. 

What with being ill and the rubbish that was going on in her life at that time, at the end of the summer of 2006 it was put away under a tarpaulin into Big Shed and, I regret to say, forgotten about.

Until this past month when she got into Big Shed and emptied it in order to drag out the rotten floor and renovated it with pallets for supports and thick slabs of marine plyboard for flooring.

And there, hidden away under a sun lounger and the tarp, was the lawn mower.

Not looking its' best, I must say. The paint's flaking in places, there are areas where it's a bit rusty, well, it looked very much like we would if we had gone through the life this poor machine has led for the past twelve years!

She dragged it out and put it in front of the Shack under a huge waterproof bag.

Yesterday, she spoke with Stuart, he is our opposite plot neighbor and asked him if he knew of a local company who would service it.

No, he didn't know of anyone but said that he would look at it for her. 

He took the top of the oil tank and looked at the dipstick, there was a minute amount of oil in the tank, then he looked at the spark plug and gave that a good rub on his jeans, he took the top of the fuel tank and asked her for paper towel.

Luckily, the Shack runs as a fully equipped kitchen and she had two rolls of it, he pulled some off, twisted it and put it into the tank to take up as much petrol as he could.

Having poured in a good amount of engine oil, a litre or so of fresh petrol and replaced the spark plug, he asked her to hold the cut-out handle whilst he primed the engine and pulled the cord.

It coughed twice, belched blue smoke and started.

To be truthful neither Stuart nor she could believe what they were hearing.. but it was true.. it was the noise of a Briggs & Stratton engine purring away happily.. having not turned over for twelve years.

She is going to send them an email tomorrow to congratulate them on this extraordinary machine. Yes, she's a bit rusty and her flakey paint work isn't as pretty and shiny as when she was new but everything works and having adjusted the height, off she trundled cutting the grass as she went.

Wasn't that a happy thing! Especially as the weather is dry and she is absolutely on target for getting all the plots ready for winter.

She's trundled up and down the track with many, many barrow loads of both manure and wood chippings, so there is now a huge amount of well rotted manure on almost all of the beds, the tall raised beds will be topped up with a mix of both manure and wood chippings, which is also what she will put onto the strawberry beds. 

She cut all the leaves down to a height of about 2" just after they produced the last flush of fruit in early August.

The garlic, onions, shallots will go in this week as well as flowering bulbs, she'll do a light prune on all the roses and cut back the vines who have raced each other up into cherry and plum trees.. silly grapes!

When she's finished planting and covering the beds, all she'll need to do is.. mow the grass.

Isn't that a happy tale.. and we had a very happy day today with a bbq. That will be in another post.

It's now bed time, she's having breakfast with Pat at Wetherspoons in Fulham at 10.30am tomorrow so chirps to you all.

GeeGee Parrot.

September 30th, 2018.

WELL! THAT STORMY WEATHER CERTAINLY GAVE OUR TOWN A GOOD 'SCRUB'.

Today has dawned bright, clear and dry! And we are off to the plots to work, she'll work whilst I sit in  what looks to be glorious sunlight.

The courgette and cucumber beds have to be turned over and manure and wood chippings piled up on top to get them ready for winter. She just cuts the bean and pea plants down and puts on manure and chippings, their roots will break down and, in doing so add, nitrogen to the soil.

Two of the Bokaski bins, which are already out there, are now ready to be emptied, she has already dug the trench into which the fermented food waste will go and in a months time, all there will be is soil, it's a great system and she wishes that more people did it, food waste that goes to landfill just encourages rats. When, if treated properly, it enriches the soil from which the plants grew.

It makes her cross when estate agents are idiots! Her much beloved Godfather was the head of the College of Estate Management and in those days, estate agents were trained in the profession of taking care of properties and land, nowadays, well, it isn't 'quite' the same!

A charming family who were going to move into one of the flats in our house have called it a day and asked for their deposit to be returned.. the estate agents kept 'faffing' about and wanting more details..  you would have thought they would have asked all the relevant questions before taking the first three months rent, wouldn't you! But apparently not.

Ahhh.. these companies are enough to drive you potty! It's a good thing we have somewhere to escape to and do sensible stuff in sunlight, isn't it?

So off we go..

GeeGee Parrot.
September 25th, 2018.

SPLISH SPLOSH, OUR STREETS ARE AWASH!

Rain! Vast amounts of huge buckets of lubbly-jubbly rain are falling.

Now, you would think that as she had a bbq planned for today that she would be as mad as a wet hen but no.

Why not? I hear you say to yourselves, well, she looked at the weather forecast earlier this week and notified all the guests that it was being postponed until next Summer.

The rain started to spit and pitter-patter on Friday in the early afternoon and the pavements got a bit of a lick and a promise of lots more to come.

And early on morning Saturday in it came but after we had eaten our eggs and fruit, she said "I've got to go out GeeGee, I've library books to exchange and those empty buckets, plus one full of IshPol, to collect from Bartek in Streatham".

So, she thought, quite sensibly, I cannot go out wearing sandals and went looking in her shoe cupboard for her largest pair of ankle boots.

And prayed and they were answered. Her left little toe went happily into a sock and boot without a squeak or a twinge and she slipped an extra sole into her right boot and trod down hard on it.. NO pain. Yippee. Little toe mended and verruca on its' way out.

She blew me a kiss, turned on the radio, loaded up WW with library books, put on a jacket with a hood, picked up her keys and left for the Kings Road.

It was very quiet.. there was almost no one in sight, only a few brave souls with an urgent need to be out and about were on the streets, the ground in St.Luke's gardens were covered in twigs and leaves. The wind was certainly a'blowing, that was for sure and the rain was absolutely tipping down. 

Any thoughts of going out to the allotments were dismissed immediately but she smiled and was thankful for the rain, for although the grass is green again, the ground is still rock hard and October is just around the corner, this is the month that she plants bulbs of all sorts, flowers, broad beans, garlic, onions.

There is a lot to do before Autumn really sets in and if you want good things to eat next year, you start off now.

The RHS Autumn Show will be held at Vincent Square in London on the 2nd and 3rd of October,
she goes every year to buy good quality vegetable seeds and to see Selina, do you remember her, from Marylebone Farmer's Market?

She makes those Malaysian dumplings and will be in the Great Hall, two words to describe them are slurpicious and scrummydumptious. Yes, they're really that good!

Now it's Sunday morning and it is a very wet day indeed, but she is thinking of her soil going glug glug glug and is very happy and those autumn raspberries will be very happy indeed. 

Mr. & Mrs. Worm will be ecstatic, this summer has been bad for worms and thousands of animals of all breeds have died through lack of water.

Yes, she could get up and start working on the sitting room but no, she isn't going to. She did our bedroom one day this week, it is now a calm, clean and immaculately tidy room.

Tomorrow she's having breakfast with Pat at Wetherspoons at Fulham Broadway, they have much to talk about and are meeting at 10.30am.

So the sorting out, cleaning and tidying of the poor sitting room will start on Wednesday. Tuesday she will go out to the allotments to see how they fared with the rain and the wind and to cut Brian's grass.

He is film set designer.. an Oscar winner no less and is very busy, so she's offered to cut his grass for him. It means that it won't go to seed and they won't blow all over her plots.. method in her generosity! 

There's food in chilly white larger and vegetable baskets, she's books to read, me to cuddle, sees no point in going out there and I've got a huge chunk of ripe SpinyApple to munch.

PipPip.

GeeGee Parrot.
September 23rd, 2018.  

EASYLIFE GROUP (UK) STILL HAVEN'T BOTHERED TO CONTACT HER NOR HAVE THEY DELIVERED THE ORDER..

If ParcelForce, Royal Mail, UPS, Fedex, DPD and Uber can all find our house.. why can't that useless delivery company Yodel?

Well, I don't have the answer to that but I guess it is because they are as bad as the catalogue company, EasyLife Group, who employ them.

They take your money, oh yes, they're quick to do that but packing and sending out your order and getting it delivered to the correct address? 

Well, they're not very good at that, which might explain why, if you telephone their customer service line on the dot of 9am, you will be told that you are number 25 or higher in the queue waiting to speak to an advisor!

And no, they haven't refunded her money.

So yes, she is going to complain about them verbally, on-line and to the Citizens Advice Bureau because it isn't legal to take money but fail to deliver goods.

GeeGee Parrot.
September 22nd, 2018.

STAN SMITH ISN'T A SHOE..

Living in London and being a member of the British Library, the English Speaking Union, the Royal Academy and the Victoria & Albert Museum means that she has lots of things to do when the weather is dire or when they have something fun / interesting to watch or listen to.

On Wednesday off she went to the V&A to listen to a talk being given by Stan Smith.

No, she isn't dotty because he isn't just a name that Addidas puts on a white leather shoe, for those of a certain age, he is the young American who won the 1972 Wimbledon singles title and lots of other titles as well.

He's the man who married the first woman to wear a white sweater with the orange P, the P stands for Princeton. Margory Gengler was a phenomenal tennis player who swapped tennis for marrying Stan and having their four children.

When she saw the talk advertised in the Autumn programme of the V&A, memories flooded into her mind, memories of Andalucia in the '70s.

I have written before about her friend, his name was Lee Setomer. Lee had been a civil engineer who settled in the very early '50s in southern Spain buying a vast acreage of land to the back of Torremolinos.

His hospitality was legendary and there were always people staying and coming and going. 

And that is where she met this couple, they were engaged to be married, Margy gave her parents' address in Locust Valley but time moves on and she never did call or write to get in contact with her. 

And forty five years later.. they were going to be here in London at the V&A and he was going to talk about 'How people think I'm a shoe'.

She was early and first in line, behind her came a couple who introduced themselves, they were brother and sister, her name was Charlotte and his was John Beddington,.

When she asked them if they knew the Smiths, he smiled and said he had played tennis with Stan two weeks ago and when he asked her if she knew the Smiths she laughed and said "this will be the first time I've seen them in 45 years" and told them about meeting them all those years ago.

They were let into the museum and guided to the lecture hall, suddenly Margy was there and greeted the couple with whom she was walking and John said "And here is someone whom you haven't seen for a very long time.." 

And my mama shook her hand and said "Andalucia, the summer of 1973, Louise, your mother and you were staying with a friend of mine".. and Margy smiled and said "Yes, indeed we were, with Lee Setomer".

The lecture hall was packed.. full to the brim.. of all different ages, to listen to a man talk of his life. A man who has led a 'good' life. A man who has never disgraced his family.

She left the lecture hall and smiled as she walked home. How very pleasant to hear a talk of good and happy things that people have done with their families and for other people, for there are tennis players whose lives are train wrecks and whose behavior on and off the court leaves a great deal to be desired. 

So, take our word for it.. Stan Smith ain't just a shoe.

GeeGee Parrot.
September 21st, 2018. 

THE EASYLIFEGROUP CATALOGUE.. WHAT A WASTE OF TIME & MONEY.

Sometimes you should realise that some deals are too good to true and sadly, after paying quite a bit of money on the 5th September to the EasyLifeGroup catalogue for four items to be delivered, she realises this is true.

After waiting for over a week, she had to call them and ask "Where is my order?" A customer service representative told her that Yodel had been unable to deliver the items as the address didn't exist.. she told them in a rather sarcastic tome of voice that as DPD, ParcelForce, the Royal Mail and Uber all find this house with no problem whatsoever on a regular basis she found that really hard to believe or understand.

The EasyLifeGroup customer service woman said that the order would be delivered on Monday, 17th of September. So she put a large note on the door but guess what? Despite the large note, despite her being in ALL day and Yodel having her mobile number they failed, yet again, in the simple task of delivering this order.

And despite multiple calls and emails to the EasyLife Group customer service department on Tuesday, 18th September no one had the courtesy to respond explaining why the goods did not arrive on Monday.

So having checked to see if there were any emails from this company this morning, she gave up.. she telephoned their customer service department, there is absolutely no point in emailing them as they never respond, and waited in line on the telehone for eleven minutes and told a man that she wanted a full refund.

He said it would take at least two weeks for this to be activated.. when she asked why it would take so long, his response was it has to be sanctioned and then to go through our banking system.

You know what?

She has had it with these online virtual 'shops', their delivery company are usually rubbish, they don't deliver on time which is a waste of time and so she's going to go to WILCO - bless their hearts - on Fulham Broadway, she will look at their catalogue, place an order and get the order delivered to the shop.

Job done.. yes, she may pay pay a fraction more BUT.. she won't have to wait for over two weeks and still not have the goods for which she paid .. she'll get the goods within two days with no delivery fee.

GeeGee Parrot.
September 20th, 2018.