31 July 2022 Extreme heat and pot pourri

Mrs L

Jul 31

It's hard to recall now, looking outside through the rain-spattered windows, but immediately after my last blog post the weather got Dangerously Hot. We stayed indoors and kept hydrated, but even so, an immense lethargy descended upon Lofas Towers. Doing anything at all was exhausting, even walking from one room to another.

On the Monday night, it was so hot that I slept outdoors in the hammock. My nightwear consisted of just my undies, and my bedcovering was an empty duvet cover, and protected from the elements in this way I was able to sleep. It was very pleasant, although a hammock is not ideal for a side-sleeper – turning over is a somewhat perilous operation.

Buoyed up by this, I decided I would sleep outside again on the Tuesday night, which was just as hot – right up until 2.30am, when it turned decidedly chilly. At that point my indoor bed beckoned. But, still, I'd had one night under the stars.

And at the weekend, I did something really exciting. We were at my uncle's – we go down once a fortnight – and Kit wanted to buy a bike, so he could keep it down there for running errands. We went into the bike shop, and it was like a little cartoon light bulb went off over my head. I should buy a bike too, I thought, then I can re-learn how to ride one, and get confident on the road, down here where it's super-flat. And then Kit and I can go biking together back home!

Kit was absolutely flabbergasted. He has been making noises for a while about getting me onto a bike, but without much hope that I would actually do it. And at home, I'm not keen: it's very up-and-downy in the Northamptonshire Uplands, and the roads are full of fast cars – scary for a rider lacking in confidence. I last rode a bike at Center Parks in 1995 (no traffic); before that, I had (briefly) had a fold-up bike while we lived in Daventry (1991). Kit doesn't remember me having this at all, probably because I only rode it once, to get to a guide meeting. The traffic terrified me, and then I went the wrong way and had to get Kit to pick me up in the car.

Before that, when I rode a bike I was young enough to be allowed to do it on the pavement. I was allowed to cycle on the road in our cul de sac, which was almost traffic-free, but I wasn't allowed to cycle on the road beyond this, because I hadn't done my cycling proficiency. I didn't mind. I loved my blue bike with its white tyres, and the speed I could get up to (our cul de sac was a very long one). I was slightly less keen on the black bike I had when I outgrew the blue one – it had a light powered by a dynamo, which was cool, but it also had gears, which I didn't understand. But it did the job, until I grew too old to ride on the pavement, and then I had to stop cycling and walk everywhere instead.

So it's perhaps unsurprising that Kit didn't realise I wanted a bike, because I didn't really realise it myself until I was in the bike shop, looking at a blue ladies' bike with white tyres, and had my light bulb moment. I bought a pink basket for it as well.

Kit also bought himself a new bike, and he was on it and biking as soon as we crossed the shop's threshold. I didn't want to get onto a bike for the first time in over 25 years in a street full of people and parked cars, so I wheeled mine for half a mile or so until we reached the quiet cul de sac before the cycle way that takes us almost all the way back to Mick's.

"You can't put it off much longer now," said Kit, who had kept pausing to let me catch up, still incredulous at the sight of his wife with her own bike.

"I know," I said, and got on the bike, wobbled, and sailed away.

It was amazing. I was instantly 7 years old again, a free spirit, the wind rushing past my face, not a care in the world. I had a brand new bike! A childhood dream so old I had forgotten it, had come true. It was exhilarating, joyous, wonderful –

"Oh fuck, I've got to stop now," I said, in some alarm, as the road at the end of the cycle way came rushing towards me.

I was nervous about using the brakes so I slowed myself by putting a foot to the ground and scuttering for a bit until I came to a halt. I turned to grin at Kit.

"You did very well," he said, "excellent upright posture and you got a surprising amount of speed there. We need to raise the saddle a bit, though."

I wheeled my bike over the roundabout but mounted it again as soon as we got to the other side, and completed the journey on wheels. I had a brand new bike! I made Kit take a photo of me before we put the bikes away.

Inside, I read the instruction book, and discovered that I should have slowed down by transferring my weight to the rear of the bike (ie, leaning back) and braking gently. The instruction book also explained about the gears (my brand new bike apparently has 21). I still didn't understand gears after reading this, so Kit explained what they are for and how they work. Kit is good at explaining things. When he had finished, I said,

"So basically I won't need them while we're cycling on the flat around here?"

"Erm. Yes. I suppose."

This is excellent news, because I still don't understand them, but if I don't actually need to use them it doesn't matter.

We aren't back down there until late on August 10^th, and then we're immediately in London for 2 days, so when we left I knew it would be 3 weeks before I could ride my brand new bike again. But I keep thinking about it and every time I do, I smile.

The next day, we held a small garden party to celebrate our final day of parenting a teenager. It was a lovely afternoon and evening (although surprisingly chilly later on) and we didn't dwell on the teenage years, mostly just chatting generally.

Penny had come for the weekend so I wanted a photo of the 3 children together – a photo I obtained after buying them an animal head torch each in Aldi. I saw the torches, and my first thought was of Penny, for Guide camp; then I remembered Rose had recently been camping; and then I thought the Esquire might find a head torch useful too. All the monkey head torches had gone so I bought a panda, a penguin, and a raccoon. I knew when I bought them which animal went with which child, but I let them decide for themselves, and was pleased when they each ended up with the "right" animal.

And every so often, that day, I thought back 20 years, to the peace and quiet of a day on my own, the girls at Mum's, while I inked in the pre-school accounts. My waters had sort-of broken that morning but there was no other sign of action so my instructions were to rest, and eat lots of energy-giving food (ie, chocolate). My waters had gone at 4am and I had 24 hours from that point in which to give birth, otherwise I would have to go into hospital, but we were counting the 24 hours from 9am when the midwife had visited. This was lucky because the Esquire did not start to put in his appearance until 5am and arrived just under 2 hours later (luckily after the midwives had turned up). It was a mad couple of hours – I did a lot of vomiting in the early stages of labour, and the midwife (who could hear me in the background) was concerned she wouldn't arrive in time. Kit then had to ring a student midwife who needed to attend a home birth as part of her training. He had no idea who he was ringing at 5am or why he was ringing her, and I was unable to explain because I was rather busy.

"It's a lovely morning to be having a baby," said the midwives, once they had arrived and the vomit-fest was over. I do remember the sunshine (and the Esquire's birthday has turned out to be one of the most reliably sunny days in the calendar) but "a lovely morning" was the last thing on my mind at the time. Anyway, as Kit told me afterwards, it was 20 minutes from when I said I couldn't do it, to when I did it, so it was all over quite quickly, it just felt like an eternity while it was going on. As, of course, is the case with so many aspects of bringing up children.

But, mission accomplished.

Although, mission not entirely complete, because this week we found ourselves trailing to the orthodontist, a place I genuinely thought I'd never visit again, as the Esquire's retainers were starting to crack and he needed replacements. We were unable to afford replacements when this happened with Penny's retainers, and I still feel hugely guilty about this – or at least, I did feel guilty, until I found out how much the Esquire's were going to cost, and then I realised that actually, there was a reason we made that decision. Anyway, getting replacements involved trips to Northampton on two consecutive days, as well as an envelope stuffed full of cash (their card reader isn't working).

We also visited the optician's this week, to make an eye test appointment for the Esquire, who had been complaining that he needs new glasses, and to get my own glasses fixed. I had 3 pairs of glasses with identical frames, but different lenses:

My last pair of simple lenses (pair A)
My first pair of varifocal lenses (pair B)
My light-reactive varifocal lenses (pair C)

The arm of pair B had bent outwards, meaning this pair won't stay on my nose in the correct position. I've no idea how it happened – I'm really careful with my glasses, because I need them all the time. But I couldn't fix this because the screw connecting the arm to the frame had somehow managed to shear itself in half and lose the top bit where a screwdriver fits in. The opticians, when I showed it to them on a previous visit, said they might be able to fix it, but I didn't have a spare pair with me that day so we left it.

Meantime, I switched to wearing pair C. But on this pair, the coating on the metal frame has worn off, causing an irritating rash where the bare metal touches the side of my nose. I keep painting over the metal with nail polish, but this is fiddly and doesn't really last.

Pair A turned up unexpectedly when I was checking through the glovebox of my car prior to lending the car to my sister. Aha, I thought. So if we can put the lenses of pair C into the frames of pair A, I have a wearable pair of light-reactive varifocals again, with the mended pair B as my emergency back-up.

In order to make this somewhat complicated set of repair arrangements work, I wore contact lenses for the first time in about a year, so I could leave all 3 pairs of glasses with the optician while we did something else. (These are varifocal contact lenses but they might as well not be – I had to hold my phone at arm's length to stand any chance of reading it – which is why I don't wear contact lenses any more). While I am wearing contact lenses is a sensible time to try on new glasses frames, because I can actually see what I look like, rather than relying on Kit telling me which ones he thinks look good (which are never the ones I think make me look good). So this was the something else we did.

Boots have now discontinued the frames I've had before, and I think it's time to go back to plastic frames which don't fall apart or give me a rash, so it was quite a hunt. Kit likes large frames on me. I don't, because the lenses are super-thick and stick out at the edge of the frame, and because large frames scream 1980s. Kit then steered me towards smaller frames, but the smaller plastic frames all had sticky-out bits where the arm joined the top of the frame. This screams Dame Edna Everage, so these are no good either. What I want is a small plastic frame, in a light neutral colour, with the arm hinge halfway down the frame.

But it would, it appears, be easier to find frames hand chiselled by elves and buffed up using the hair of Appalachian virgins.

I eventually found a pair we both liked in Specsavers, so we took photos of the labels, and hopefully this frame will still be available when I get round to getting my next pair of glasses.

While preparing to come into the opticians, I had scooped up various pairs of now unused glasses for donation. These included a pair of the Esquire's. The case was super dusty, but the specs looked fairly new, so I thought I'd just better check with him before donating them.

Turned out this is newest pair of glasses, which he'd mislaid, and now that he's found them he doesn't think he needs an eye test after all.

Kit has been drawing patterns in an old exercise book with squared paper in the evenings. He has invested in a pack of 20 coloured biros and finds this "hygge" activity very relaxing (well: he claims to, but he does spend an awful lot of time swearing over it when he goes wrong.) Unfortunately, when you are making patterns using squared paper, it is all too easy to find you have accidentally drawn a series of swastikas. So he also spends quite a lot of time de-Nazifying his hygge.

And then on Friday, Kit disappeared.

He had biked into school to water the plants. I used this time to chop back the rosemary and the bay tree, and then looked up how to dry these for storage. It seemed very simple – in the oven, on the lowest possible setting – so I spread the leaves and sprigs in old baking tins, humming happily and thinking about how I could give everybody hand-tied herbs next Christmas and wow I am actually living in a Jane Austen novel (NB: I am still attempting to dry the herbs two days later, and the oven now smells slightly of decomposing vegetation).

All of this took a while, and then I did some more gardening (I did eventually reach gardening Nirvana this weekend, as everything I intended to plant this summer is now actually in the ground, so it's just weeding, watering and cutting back from now on). This included disentangling bindweed from a selection of plants, which takes ages. We keep pulling out and digging up bindweed but it's a dispiriting job, and the bindweed itself is so damn cheerful, as it scrambles through shrubs in exactly the way my clematis plants never do.

Eventually I realised Kit had been gone for an awfully long time – six hours – long enough to bike to the next village, water some plants, and come back again, several times over.

I messaged him. An hour later he had not looked at his phone. So I called him, and heard his phone ringing in the kitchen. So if he had come off his bike into a ditch, hidden from passing motorists by the vegetation, he had no way of summoning help. And he couldn't possibly have intended to be away for so long – he hadn't taken a packed lunch.

This really rattled me. Wild visions of conversations with the police came into my mind – "But, officer, it's so completely out of character – he knew we were going to the tip this afternoon!" But just as I decided that if he didn't come back in 10 minutes, I'd drive out to look for him, Kit turned up.

He hadn't just gone to water the plants. He'd gone to do an entire day's work, taking only an apple and a bag of crisps.

Kit's absence meant our trip to the tip was deferred until yesterday. Among the items to have emerged from Rose's room for disposal were two inflatable mattresses. I was reluctant to part with these until we'd tested to see if they could be passed on to a worthy cause (or even retained). The electric pump doesn't work off Kit's car (and my car is still on holiday at my sister's) and we couldn't find the correct adaptor for the foot pump or the hand pump, so the mattresses stayed sitting forlornly in the hall.

I was then considerably startled, yesterday, by the frantic sound of an animal in distress, inside the house. I rushed out from the kitchen into the living room and found that Kit had found the correct adaptor, and the sound I could hear was the wailing of the foot pump. Both mattresses are now inflated and we're trying to summon the courage to sleep on them, because this is the acid test of an inflatable mattress.

If we get another hot spell, we might try them outside. But we might not, because of biting insects. It looks like a horsefly got inside my clothes while I was gardening, because I have seven – SEVEN – bites in a line down my body, from my armpit to my hip. They are hot and inflamed and they hurt (and yes, I am taking antihistamine tablets). They have kept me awake for two nights, just when I was hoping to get back into early mornings, because the Esquire is currently on nights and needs picking up at 6.15am.

But when I feel a bit pissed off, I think of my brand new bike waiting for me in Somerset, and I can't help but smile.

Comment