Lois and I have only one thing on
our to-do list this morning, and we manage to screw it up as usual – oh dear!
Our neighbour Bill, who sadly
died about 4 weeks ago, is having his funeral ceremony today. The ceremony is scheduled
for 11am, but for some reason Lois has got the idea into her head that it will be taking place at 12:30 pm – and she says later, she thinks she must have mixed the time
up with the time of her friend Sheila's funeral which took place at 12:30pm a
few weeks ago.
But I blame myself in part, too,
because I didn't check up on the time, which was clearly marked with a cross on
our wall calendar. I think I've recently become overly laid-back and blasé - in
the past I was almost fanatical about checking out all the details of upcoming
events: the time, the address, how best to get there and the like, to the point
of being annoying to Lois and to everyone else.
part of our wall calendar – the one I
failed to look at,
when it came to checking the time
Bill's funeral was scheduled for - damn it!
11:30 In all innocence we take
the bus into town and head to St.Gregory's, the town’s largest Catholic church,
but we find it is deserted, except for 2-3 people who pop into the church, dip
their hand in holy water, say a prayer, or make some sort of peculiar holy
gestures while looking at the altar or standing in front of it, before finally
sneaking out again.
I have never been to a Catholic
church in the UK before, only as a tourist in Italy and Hungary. An interesting
experience - I suppose Catholics pop in to get some help or encouragement from
God if they are having a difficult day, but I'm not entirely sure - the jury is
still out on that one.
St Gregory's, the town’s largest
Catholic church
Catholics seem to like to pop into a
church and dip their hand in holy water -
if they are in the middle of a difficult
day perhaps?
If you are raised in a Protestant
church, you become accustomed to the notion that you can pray to God from
wherever you happen to be, but Catholics may be able to get a better connection
in a physical church, in front of an altar and surrounded by statues and the
like. I suppose it’s all a bit like different types of internet connection:
dial-up, wifi, 3G, 4G, etc., but I'm not too sure about that either. Anyone know?
12:00 Meanwhile, Lois and I
wander around a bit nervously inside this huge church, looking at the statues,
etc., while we wait for the other guests to show up.
After 10-15 minutes, I get a
little worried that no other guests have appeared, and I browse through the
church's calendar, which I spot on a table – and I suddenly realise that the
funeral ceremony has already taken place and now of course it’s all over.
12:30 We take the bus home and
drop in a bit sheepishly next door, where Bill's 2 sons, Neil and Andrew, and
Bill's daughter Debbie and her partner Clyde, who live in New Zealand, are
already holding the get-together. Most of the guests are Bill's relatives, but
Francis and Stephen are also there - Bill's neighbours on the other side, two
doors away from us. The dining table is “groaning” with lots of delicious
food as a buffet. We talk to a lot of people, and it's warm in Bill's backyard,
where the get-together is being held.
Bill's New Zealander son-in-law Clyde tells us that the family
plans to sell the house, rather than rent it out, which Lois and I, and also
Stephen and Francis, are very happy to hear - it will be friendlier to have
permanent new neighbours, rather than a succession of different ones.
He says they got a number of estimates
from various real estate agents - and the lowest was still over £400,000 -
yikes! But Bill's house has been fully modernised in the fashionable way: an
all-in-one kitchen-dining-living-dining area, a master bedroom with its own
bathroom, as well as a family bathroom,
and a relatively low-maintenance backyard - just lawns and shrubs: exactly the
kind house a couple with kids would opt for.
I myself prefer our separate
kitchen, separate dining room, and separate living room thank you very much. It's nice to be able to eat without having to see all the pots and pans waiting
to be washed up, and it's nice that one person can watch TV while someone else can
do something else in another room, without hearing the television blaring away all
the time.
It is true, however, that Lois
sometimes wishes we could hold large parties where people stand and chat in one
big room, but I’m going to let that one slide - I myself am very happy that our
house is not ideal for such events, I have to say ha ha ha.
15:00 Eventually we become tired
of all the chit-chat, and we decide to come home and go to bed for a few hours
in our daughter Sarah's old room.
The window is wide open, and we
can still hear the chit-chat from Bill's relatives in his backyard as we relax in Sarah's old double bed.
Flashback to July 7 - Sarah's old
window in happier times
with our backyard to the left, and Bill’s
to the right.
We feel like real old crows today,
because we got the time of the funeral ceremony wrong – my god, how
embarrassing! Although Bill's sons and daughter don't seem to be offended,
which is nice. Let's hope we're not late for our own funerals ha ha!
17:00 Alison, our daughter in
Haslemere, calls us while we are still in bed - Lois and I hope to visit them
in August after returning from a camping holiday in southern France.
We roll out of bed and go for a
short walk on the local football field and post a letter in the nearby mailbox.
we go for a short walk on the
local football field
19:00 We grab a quick snack
dinner and spend the rest of the evening watching a bit of television. An
interesting documentary (part 2 of 3) is on, giving the background to the late stand-up
comedian Victoria Wood's famous sitcom "Dinnerladies", which used to be one
of our favourite sitcoms.
Victoria Wood was a slightly unusual
performer, to put it mildly. When her sitcom "Dinnerladies" was
recorded in front of a live audience, she decided to be her own warm-up guy.
She used to explain that she was a stand-up comedian by profession, so why should
she have to pay some other stand-up to warm up the audience?
Standup comedian Victoria Wood
was her own warm-up guy
when her "Dinnerladies"
sitcom was being recorded in front of a live audience
The sitcom revolved around a
bunch of women working in the kitchen of a large cafeteria in a workplace in
the north of England. One of the long-running features of the series was that
the women did not hesitate to discuss their sex lives quite openly with each other.
Lois worked for years in a kitchen for a local nursing home, and she says that
this trait about women working together is actually very realistic.
Lois says it is very
characteristic of women working together
to discuss their sex lives quite openly with each other
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzzzz
!!!!!
Danish translation
Lois og jeg har kun én opgave på vores gøremålsliste i formiddag, og vi
når at fucke den op, som sædvanligt. Vores nabo Bill, der desværre for omkring
4 uger siden døde, har sit begravelsesceremoni
i dag. Ceremoniet finder sted kl 11, men Lois har af en eller anden
grund fået den tanke i sit hoved, at det skal finde sted kl 12:30 – hun synes,
hu havde blandet tiden sammen med tiden af sin veninde Sheilas begravelse, der
fandt sted kl 12:30 for et par uger siden.
Men jeg bebrejder mig selv delvis også, fordi jeg ikke tjekkede op på
tiden, som var tydeligt markeret med et kryds sat i vores vægkalenderen. Jeg
synes, jeg for nylig er blevet alt for afslappet og blasé – før i tiden var jeg
næsten fanatisk om at tjekke alle detaljerne om kommende begivenheder: tid,
adresse og den slags, til det punkt af at irritere Lois og alle andre.
en del af
vores vægkalender, som jeg undlod at tjekke,
når det kom
til tiden, Bills begravelse blev bestemt til – pokkers!
11:30 Vi tager bussen ind i byen og går hen til St.Gregory’s, byens
største katolske kirke, men vi finder den er mennesketom, bortset fra 2-3
personer, der smutter ind i kirken, dypper hånden i helligt vand, siger en bøn,
eller laver mærkelige hellige gestusser mens de kigger på alteren eller står
foran den, og til sidst smutter ud igen.
Jeg har aldrig været i en katolsk kirke i Storbritannien før, kun som
turist i Italien og Ungarn. En interessant oplevelse – jeg formoder, at
katolikere smutter ind for at få lidt hjælp eller opmuntring fra Gud, hvis de
er i gang med at opleve en vanskelig
dag, men det er jeg ikke helt sikker på – juryen er stadig ude om det.
St
Gregory’s, byens største katolske kirke
Katolikere
synes at smutte ind i en kirke og dyppe hånden i helligt vand,
hvis de er
midt i en vanskelig dag, mistænker jeg
Hvis man bliver opdraget i en protestant kirke, bliver man vænnet til
det begreb om, at man kan bede til Gud fra hvor som helst man kommer til at
være, men katolikere måske kan få en bedre forbindelse i en fysisk kirke, foran
en alter og omgivet af statuer og den slags. Jeg formoder, at det hele ligner
forskellige typer af internetforbindelser: dialup, wifi, 3G, 4G osv, men det også er jeg
ikke helt sikker på.
12:00 I mellemtiden vandrer Lois og jeg rundt lidt nervøst indenfor
denne enorme kirke og kigger på statuerne osv, mens vi venter på, at de andre
gæster dukker op.
Efter 10-15 minutter bliver jeg lidt bekymret over, at ingen andre
gæster er dukket op, og jeg blader igennem kirkens kalender, som jeg får øje på
på et bord – jeg bliver pludselig klar over, at begravelsesceremoni allerede
fandt sted og nu er det hele slut selvfølgelig.
12:30 Vi tager bussen hjem og smutter ind hos nabohuset, hvor Bills 2
sønner, Neil og Andrew, og Bills datter Debbie og hendes partner Clyde, der bor
i New Zealand, er allerede i gang med at holde gravøllet. De fleste gæster er
Bills slægtninge, men Francis og Stephen er også der – Bills naboer på den
modsatte side af hans hus, to døre væk fra vores. Spisebordet bugner med masser
af lækker mad – en stående buffet. Vi
snakker med en masse mennesker, og det er varmt i Bills baghave, hvor gravøllet
holdes.
Clyde fortæller os, at familien har planer om at sælge huset, snarere
end at udleje det, hvilket Lois og jeg, også Stephen og Francis er meget glade
for, at høre – det vil være venligere, at have permanente nye naboer, snarere,
end en række forskellige.
Han siger, at de har fået en række vurderinger fra forskellige
ejendomsmæglere – og den laveste var stadig over 400.000£ - yikes! Men Bills
hus er blevet fuldt moderniseret på den moderigtige måde: et alt-i-ét køkkenområde-spiseområde-stueområde,
et mesterværelse med eget badeværelse, udover et familiebadeværelse, og en forholdsvis
lav-maintence baghave – bare græsplæn og buske: præcis det slags hus et par med børn ville
optere for.
Jeg selv foretrækker vores adskilte køkken, adskilte spisestue, og
adskilte stue thank you very much! Det er rart at kunne spise uden at måtte se alle de potter og
pander, der venter på at blive opvasket, og det er rart, at ét menneske kan se
på fjernsynet, mens nogen anden kan gøre noget andet i et andet værelse uden at
høre fjernsynet hele tiden.
Det er sandt imidlertid, at Lois nogle gange ønsker vi kunne holde store
fester, hvor folk står og snakker i ét stort rum, men det springer jeg over –
jeg er meget glad for, at huset er ikke ideelt til sådanne eventer, det må jeg
nok sige.
15:00 Vi er blevet trætte af sniksnakken, og vi beslutter at komme hjem
og gå i seng i et par timer i vores datter Sarahs gamle værelse. Vinduet åbent
på vid gab, og vi kan stadig høre sniksnakken fra Bills slægtninge i hans
baghave, mens vi ligger inde i Sarahs gamle dobbeltseng.
Tilbageblik
til den 7. juli – Sarahs gamle vindue i lykkeligere tider
med vores
baghave til venstre, og Bills til højre.
Vi føler os som ægte gamle krager, på grund af, at vi fik tiden af
begravelsesceremoniet forkert – du godeste, hvor pinligt! Selvom Bills sønner
og datter synes ikke at være krænket, hvilket er rart.
17:00 Alison, vores datter i Haslemere, ringer til os, mens vi ligger
inde i sengen – Lois og jeg håber at besøge dem i august efter de kom tilbage fra en
campingferie i det sydlige Frankrig.
Vi vælter ud af sengen og går en kort tur på den lokale fodboldbane og
lægge et brev i den nærliggende postkasse.
vi går
en kort tur på den lokale fodboldbane
19:00 Vi snupper en hurtig snack-aftensmad og bruger resten af aftenen på
at se lidt fjernsyn. De viser en interessant dokumentarfilm (2. del af 3), der
handler om den standup komiker Victoria Woods berømte sitcom ”Dinnerladies”, én
af vores yndlings-sitcoms.
Victoria Wood var en lidt usædvanlig performer, for at sige mildt. Når
hendes sitcom ”Dinnerladies” blev optaget foran et live publikum, besluttede
hun at være sin egen opvarmer. Hun plejede at sige, at hun var standup komiker
af profession, så hvorfor skulle hun betale nogen anden til at opvarme
publikummet.
Standup
komikeren Victoria Wood var sin egen opvarmer,
når hendes ”Dinnerladies”-sitcom
blev optaget foran et live publikum
Sitcommen kredsede om et bundt kvinder, der arbejdede i køkkenet af et
stort cafeteria i en arbejdsplads i det nordlige England. En af seriens mest iøjnefaldende
egenskaber var, at kvinderne tøvede ikke med at diskutere åbenlyst deres sexliv
med hinanden. Lois arbejdede i årevis i
et køkken til et lokalt plejehjem, og hun siger, at denne egenskab om kvinder,
der arbejder sammen, faktisk er meget realistisk.
Lois
siger, at det er meget karakteristisk for kvinder,
der arbejder
sammen, ikke at tøve med at diskutere åbenlyst deres sexliv med hinanden
22:00 Vi går i seng – zzzzzzzzzz!!!!!
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