Hopefully he’s slowly improving. He said yesterday that he didn’t “feel like death” so fingers crossed he’s getting better. His hospital ward is marginally better than the last one although owing to a lack of jelly beans I was still tempted to stuff his pink fluffy, waxy earplugs up my nose to cut out the smells. All the other inmates still look dead – all lying back asleep with their mouths wide open – my brother said “you don’t need to worry about the ‘O’ face, it’s the ‘Q’ face that’s bad” – that’s when the tongue is lolling out to the side. Yuk. My father had asked me to bring in some Bassetts Licorice Allsorts – which I think is a pretty good sign.

Talking of signs, although I’m not a person who chooses to follow a specific religion, I like to think of myself as vaguely spiritual and quite often find signs pertaining to my life. Sometimes I even ask for them. I am not quite sure who puts them there, or who I am asking, but they seem to say something important anyway. For example, I have probably mentioned this before, but on the day that our “Decree Nisi” came through I was having dinner in a restaurant with my ex husband. We were still attempting to find a way through the mess of our broken marriage. My mother had recently pointed out that not only were we flogging a dead horse, the dead horse had maggots in it”, but still we wouldn’t give up. My ex had just finished his main course and his white plate was completely empty when suddenly sitting right in the middle of the plate was a huge black caterpillar/maggotty thing. I mean huge. We had no idea how it got there and at one point my ex even accused me of bringing it in a bag and secretly flicking it at him when he wasn’t looking.

There have been lots of other signs too over the years including several plagues….

I was dreading coming back into the house today. I was not sure whether I would find yet more revolting flies. But instead, on my doorstep was this:-

…and not a fly in sight.

He’s in a ward. It’s noisy and smelly. He’s got wires going in and wires going out (I love that song). There are huge machines attached to the wall behind each of the six beds that take up a ridiculous amount of space. They are the TV screens and music and telephone systems that cost a huge amount to use. Looking around, it seems that they have become almost completely redundant. Everybody had their ipods, their DVD players and their mobile phones. What a ridiculous waste of money. It would have been far better spent designing moving shelves that are actually convenient for a person who is sitting in a bed. Have you ever noticed how badly designed all the cupboards and tables are? Nothing was where my father needed it to be…and it certainly isn’t going to get any better in any of the NHS hospitals within the foreseeable future, given our budget deficit and yesterday’s announcement about cost cutting options.

The kids are with their father this weekend which meant I could escape London as soon as I’d taken my youngest one to school. I’m not sure I”m ready for the new term yet – I can’t quite face the routine and anyway, I am still suffering from the torture of the slow drip drip effect of kids going back to school over a long drawn out period. Two are back but one doesn’t start until next Tuesday. Good grief. I have had children at home for three months now, given that my son finished hugely early after his GCSE’s.

Normal services will resume next week. Busier roads. Cheaper holidays. Quieter shops. Happier parents. Stressed kids. Swine flu increase. Less money owing to new uniform for giant children (teenage son now in 6th form and needs suits/shirts and ties) and all of them require a huge investment of funds into a new pencil case full of stuff that seems to have miraculously disappeared since last term.

I’m full of good cheer today aren’t I.

Sorry.

Have a good weekend y’all. xx

PS Anybody want to join my “happy parents go on cheap summer holidays whilst their kids are at school with shiny pencil cases” club?