We went down to Salisbury on Wednesday morning so The Builder could attend the funeral of Barb’s mother (his former mother in law). I realise that the lady is no longer with us and that there is therefore no real hurry for the funeral to be held. I don’t suppose that she was champing at the bit or tapping her foot impatiently. But I must say that the Australian in me was really quite profoundly shocked by the three week delay between the death and the funeral. It just seems somehow wrong for there to be such a long gap - though many people may think the 3 days or so in Australia shows unseemly haste!. It was because of a backlog of cremations following the Christmas/New Year closure of the crematorium and an unusually high number of deaths which they think might have been caused by the sudden cold snap around Christmas. I know that the crematorium staff would expect to have the public holidays off - but they surely don’t expect the Grim Reaper to take a ten day holiday just because they want to have the time between Christmas and New Year as well? Seems very odd to me. And I’m not sure why a cold spell in December should see a spike in the death rates. People who are of an age to receive the Age Pension get paid £125 a year towards the winter heating bills. If you are over 80 you get £200. And if the temperature drops below zero for 7 consecutive days you get an additional £25 each time so there’s no real need for people to freeze to death. Perhaps they all picked up viruses or flu.

Anyway. I don’t suppose it really mattered. It’s not as though Barb’s mum was going anywhere or was particularly inconvenienced! The Builder and I ambled down to Salisbury and had lunch in one of the pubs on the market square, then went for a wander around. Then he went to the funeral and I pottered about in the shops. There is a kitchen shop on the town square which Barb had very unkindly drawn my attention to. It’s like a magic cave full of delicious cooking equipment and serving things ad it goes on for ever. It is most definitely a shop we will have to keep Ian absolutely out of!! There were so many things that positively insisted that they wanted to come home with me. But showing considerable self restraint and fortitude I managed to leave without buying anything. (This may be because I had not a lot of money with me and also didn’t have the car to put things it - it had gone to the funeral with The Builder - but we will put it down to restraint and fortitude for the moment!!) I did buy something in Lakeland (another kitchen shop), but only some cling film. I bought a book on growing vegetables in another shop. And that was it. A highly austere shopping trip!

Then I took the bus out to Nunton, where lives The Builder’s mother. It was quite exciting, trying to buy a ticket on the bus. The ticket machine wasn’t working - wouldn’t accept the driver’s pass number to sign him in. Never mind, he said. We’ll sort it all out later, when you get off. And most people had passes and return tickets anyway. There were only a couple of us without. And he managed to fix the machine before we set off. As we passed through Odstock, it occurred to me that I didn’t actually know where the bus stop was in Nunton. So I pressed the button as we went past the village sign and stood p. And was astounded when the bus driver asked if I wanted to be dropped anywhere in particular, or would the bus stop do?!?!?!?!?! The bus stop was fine by me - hadn’t realised I could have my pick! And as I got off all the other passengers watched me carefully - I think they must have suspected that I was just visiting and not a regular user of the 3:20 bus from Salisbury :-) And the bus driver wouldn't accept any money for the ride. He said it had been his problem and not mine!

Gwen had been looking out for me and was out on the side path to her unit. She was worried that I might not be able to find her place from the bus stop (You can see her place from the bus stop!). We had tea and home made chocolate muffins and a nice chat until The Builder turned up at about quarter past four. Then we had more tea, more muffins and more chatting until five o’clock when The Builder and I left to come home.

I believe that the funeral went very well, as did the afternoon tea which followed.

We stopped for dinner at the Air Balloon near Gloucester. Although, I wasn’t really hungry. And my back was aching. And so was my neck. And my shoulders. And I was still tired. I put all this down to spending most of the day in the car and not doing very much and eating too much cake. Then I got up yesterday morning and everything was still aching only worse. And I still wasn’t very hungry. And I had a coff. And I was STILL tired. And none of that would have kept me home from work yesterday, for my diary was quite busy. It was the waves of dizziness which beset me from time to time. No point going to work when aching all over AND feeling dizzy. I arranged for other people to cover the things in my diary and stayed at home and drank tea and read my book and played with the cat. I’m home again today too, although feeling quite a bit better. Still ache and still have a cough but nothing like so dizzy. Fortunately, my diary was nice and quiet today so nobody is really going to miss me.

It has been quite exciting, sitting in our lounge room today. At about half past nine two men in yellow coats came and closed QVR from Ankerbold Road up towards the village. This caused a certain level of confusion because for several weeks Green Lane, up by the school, has been closed and traffic has been diverted down Ward Street and back up along QVR. Green Lane is now open again, QVR s closed and traffic is still being directed along Ward Street. Only cars were coming down Ward Street, trundling the little bit of Ankerbold and expecting to turn left onto QVR. It has been very amusing to watch it all. It was made even more amusing for the half hour that a man from the water board was stood in the down side of Ward Street fiddling with the access cover to the mains, thus effectively reducing Ward Street to a single side - to carry all that traffic. Alas - he’s gone now.

There so often are fun things to watch if I happen to be at home during the week and have nothing particular to do, so am sat in the lounge room gazing out the window.