Yes, are YOU ever guilty of "talking shop" with co-workers during lunchtime "work-do's"?
It's always a temptation isn't it. Especially for those of us - the majority I'm guessing (!) - especially for those of us without any other real interests. Am I right? Or am I right!
Well, it's high time it all stopped, all that 'malarkey', that's for sure, and, here in quiet, leafy, semi-rural Liphook, Hampshire my medium-to-long-suffering wife Lois and I were pleased to see this morning that local people from our own area are leading the way.
Another first for Liphook!
Good luck to them, we say, especially with any attempts to avoid mentioning, or telling suggestive jokes about, plant species with suggestive names - it's a total minefield, isn't it!
On our after-lunch walk through nearby Radford Park today, we wish for the umpteenth time that we had that "app" on our phones - you know, the one that tells you what a plant's name is if you upload a picture of it. We must ask our son-in-law Ed to get it for us, and that's for sure!
After researching the plant through google, Lois and I want to tentatively suggest that it may be a rare yellow version of an "arum maculatum", popularly known also, as an "adam and eve", a "lords and ladies", or a "jack in the pulpit", due to its alleged similarity to male and female genitalia in a state of copulation, when it's at home (!).
Liphook is a really friendly place, Lois and I have found, since moving here 3 months ago. People say "hello" or "hi" to complete strangers when passing them on the pavement. And we had hardly parked our car outside one of the local NHS surgeries this morning, than we were being told by some passing "old codgers" that there was "no queue", and "not to worry if you're early, they don't mind about that".
Meanwhile our younger daughter Sarah, who moved out to Australia last September with husband Francis and their 11-year twins Lily and Jessica, are also on the move.
At least they're in now, and Sarah tells us that the house has plenty of storage space, when they can get the time to put all their stuff away in it.
Lois and I are really delighted for them - it's hopefully the end of a long "journey" not just in the literal sense but also in the figurative sense. They first moved to Australia in 2015, then returned to the UK in 2023, thinking about buying a house in the UK, before thinking better of it and finally going back to Australia last September (2024).
Lois showcasing an unusual plant carrying what we fear
may be a host of "naughty names" - embarrassing !!!!!
We hope to check this tentative "arum maculatum" i.d. next Friday with those hard-working local Hampshire County Agricultural College botanists down at the Crown at Arford, their reputed "drinking hole" - that's if Dr Cynthia Devlin (see Onion News story above (!)) graciously "allows" us (!!) to even bring the matter up !!!
Lois prefers to call "our signature plant", as we call it, by what we think is one of its more mysterious but superficially "more respectable" names - the "cuckoo-pint". Until later, when I read on the web that the "pint" in "cuckoo-pint" is just a euphemism for "pintle", an old word for a penis.
What a crazy world we live in !!!!!
Lois this morning, getting "down and dirty", looking for unusual
plant species, on our walk through nearby Radford Park, Liphook
You'll have to forgive us for any levity here. We're both feeling "shattered" after lunch as we struggle through Radford Park on our post-lunch walk. This morning was another early start for us, because we were having to have our long-awaited COVID booster jabs this morning, and now we're feeling a bit "naff".
a typical NHS COVID jab - all over in a couple of minutes, including
giving name and date-of-birth, so that they can cross you off their list
I must put my cards on the table here. I'm an inveterate "early bird" and always turn up in more-than-good time for any appointment. Today we arrive at the surgery 30 minutes before our allotted time, but as we discover, we just get "waved through" and the whole thing takes only about 2 minutes, including saying names and dates-of-birth, pulling up our sleeves, getting the "jab", and walking out again. I must say that the NHS has really got its act together with COVID jabs, and so nice to see, when there are all the complaints about waiting-lists that you read in the press. Well done, NHS!
16:00 We're starting to feel a bit better after an afternoon in bed.
We're feeling a bit "on our own" today anyway, because our two daughters Alison (49) and Sarah (47) are both a bit preoccupied with their own "hassles" today (!) - we know they're reading our whatsapp texts because of the "blue ticks" that appear on our phone screens, but we're not getting any actual replies, and no surprise there, given their situations.
Lois and me today, texting our daughters and getting
the "blue ticks" of acknowledgement, but no actual replies
- and no wonder, with what they're both having to cope with today
What madness !!!!
Poor us !!!!!
Yes, our elder daughter Alison and husband Ed are "up to their eyes in it" again, clearing out the last of their belongings from the family's crumbling semi-detached mansion in nearby Headley - half of the residence built in the 1870's for John Parish, one of Queen Victoria's vice-admirals who didn't spend much time there because he was normally away, keeping the peace on the China Seas.
What madness !!!!
Ali and Ed and their 3 teenage kids will be spending the next few months in a slightly smaller mansion while builders carry out extensive repairs and improvements on Parish's "old pile" (!).
(left) Lois outside the crumbling Victorian mansion where our daughter
Alison and family live, the building being due for refurbishment this summer,
and (right) the slightly smaller, rented mansion that the family
will be "slumming" it in this summer until the builders have gone away
flashback to March 24th: the movers are already starting to empty
the semi-detached, and crumbling, Victorian mansion where our
daughter Alison lives with husband Ed and their 3 teenage kids
What madness !!!!!
[That's enough madness! - Ed]
Today they got the keys for their new home that they've bought in Perth's northern suburb of Yanchep, and have started moving their stuff in.
Francis (left) and the twins (right) relaxing and taking a breather after moving
their stuff into their new home in Perth's northern suburb of Yanchep today
And it's only 5 minutes walk to the mighty Indian Ocean, which will be nice!
Sarah and Francis' new home on a hillside in Yanchep, Western Australia,
and (right) just visible, and glinting, over the trees is a bit of the Indian Ocean
- Sarah says the beach is only 5 minutes walk away from the house
Before 2015 they both still owned properties in the UK, which they sold up before emigrating, but they never managed to buy anywhere in Australia during their next 8 years down under (2015-2023), and, instead, they spent their time moving from one rental home to another.
Lois and I think they got a bit carried away by all the chances for travel in the glorious climate down there and the opportunities for sailing and water sports, buying big 4-by-4 "off-road ready" vehicles, travelling around and "living the dream", and why not?
flashback to 2018, and mine and Lois's last trip to Australia
to "catch up with" our daughter Sarah and family
Now at last, on their second 'foray' to Australia, they've actually bought a house there, and all on their own money, with no help, not a single penny, from the so-called "bank of mum and dad", which must be so satisfying.
"Go Sarah and Francis!" - that's what we say. Or "Good on you, mate!" as the Aussies say (!).
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzz!!!!!!
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