Hubs and I decided we needed a break. What from we don’t quite know. Except for the weather this rather reminds me of the year I spent in Spain. Every day is a holiday!
Twenty some odd years later we are not so footloose and fancy free but a whole lot further away even if Skype does periodically bring my children into my study, kitchen or living room!
We needed a break from the holiday!
Having decided yesterday that it was time for another layer of clothing I pulled on my silk long johns and dug out my mink ear muffs and with a scarf and gloves was ready to go. Hubs was hard on my heels.
It was cold! A biting wind had me wishing for a nose muff too and leather gloves are going to have to be layered on top of a pair of woolen, one size fits all, mits.
I’d been drinking a lot of water since my amazing discovery yesterday, a busy day for my mind, that water did indeed help the aching bones in my body. I had reached for the ibuprofen and finding the cupboard bare I drank some water instead and lo and behold, my lower back began to feel better, so I drank some more! Apparently I’ve been very remiss since arriving on these fair shores as far as hydrating goes; two reasons spring to mind, one, it doesn’t get hot enough to remind me to drink water and two, when I’m out and about I do not like looking for loos everywhere I go.
On the way through Victoria station I admitted to my shadow that I needed to pee and he said,
“I was afraid of that, so do I.”
He never passes up a comfortable toilet so we went to the Grosvenor Hotel in the station and nodded to the concierge and other members of staff as we made our way confidently downstairs to the cloakrooms.
On my way back through the lobby a lady stopped me to compliment me on my ear muffs,
“Where did you buy them?” she asked.
“In New York,” hubs chimed in appearing from behind me, “twenty-five years ago!”
Oooh, was it that long? I was pregnant with my firstborn and we were taking a break of a very different sort!
On our way down to the underground I said to hubs,
“I should have just taken them off and given them to her shouldn’t I?” He gave me a ‘no you shouldn’t have’ look and we carried on to Portobello Road on a Christmas gift quest.
Notting Hill was a far more pleasant place than the Saturday we had previously visited, there weren’t the stalls and the crowds, we could walk and breathe.
Plenty of the shops were open and we were able to browse and tinker at our leisure while we grew steadily colder and colder.
I eventually persuaded hubs he needed a wool hat but not before admitting, for the second time in one outing, that I needed to find a loo again. No handy hotel this time but I did go into a Café Nero after extracting a promise from my nearest and dearest to buy something, preferably to nibble on, definitely not to drink!
When I emerged he was sitting at a table chatting to a lady. They were in line for the one convenience, ‘for customer use only.’ I took his place and continued his conversation with the Irish woman who knew a friend of a friend who had been to Dallas for a year.
We left the café without a purchase …
…and bought a woolly hat before making our way back to the underground, the temperature had dropped and was getting the better of us after two hours.
I used to remember the tubes being stifling hot during the winter, I’d get on in all my cold weather gear and start to peel off, a very inconvenient feature of the tube that seems to have been rememdied in the years I’ve been gone!
Perished, we made it to Victoria and our homebound train with minutes to spare and had to move from one very chilly carriage to another where the heaters were taking the edge off…just.
At Beckenham we made our way to the post office where we spent a small fortune on stamps with which to post all our Christmas cards.
And the Christmas present quest? We were successful in that we now know what won’t work and unsuccessful as far as purchasing anything.
We’ll have to take another break when our bones have been warmed from the inside by sufficient quantities of hot tea.
Well hello there! My name is Vivienne McNeny.
I am an empty nester exploring life as a Boomer…you could say I'm happily Boomering along!
As a homeschooling Mum I have finally quit the job of role model and mentor to my four children. I do what I want to do, eat when I feel like it, enjoy life with my blue eyed cowboy and clean my house once a month or so whether it needs it or not!
In true English form I write about the emergence of my true identity now that I can no longer hide behind my children as their Mum.
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