Virtually Living Again!

Finally! The day before yesterday my cell phone returned -- the old one after 3 weeks of repair attempts was replaced! And yesterday, the computer which had been gone just over a week, was repaired. A new hard drive was necessary -- a bit disappointing after only 18 or so months, and getting it all up and working properly again is an ongoing process. But, hey, hey, hey I can blog comfortably once again in the comfort of my own space!

The 70th birthday celebration was a great success. Everyone agreed that the 70 year-old pictured in the cake looked just like Alan Whicker! All 12 children and 2 babies behaved perfectly! Not a tear was shed, not a cry was heard all day ... The car, by the way, is a Sunbeam Rapier, which was The Man's car bought when he was in Cyprus with the RAF in the very early 60's -- he adored this car and I've been unsuccessfully trying to find him a model of it for years -- so now he has one made of icing!

Needless to say at our age we were exhausted by the end of the day and still had another one to go! I don't know how they did it, but my brother and sister-in-laws managed to come up with a roast beef and Yorkshire pudding Sunday lunch for at least 12 of us -- I was still past counting!!! At the end of the day a very old-fashioned kind of moment. The man and I and our two grown sons and their Aunt and Uncle sat around the telly and watched Downton Abbey together -- something families used to do together all the time and now seems rarer than hens' teeth!

Monday morning, 3 a.m. and it was time to wakey wakey and set off for Stanstead airport with son living in Italy. Bleary-eyed we got there in plenty of time to keep Ryan Air from denying him passage and were soon on our way North! Honestly, I could  not believe the traffic at 4.00 a.m. -- all the way up the M1 to the M6 till we got home at 9.30 -- streams of cars going both ways. Every morning I get up at 5.00 a.m. for my cup of tea and English muffin and BBC World Business Report imagining it to be the quiet time of the day! It seems the quiet is only in my imagination...

Monday, I'm off again back to London. First stop: Heathrow at 9.50 p.m. to pick up my youngest sister all the way from Quechee, Vermont on her first trip to Europe! We will be staying together at the Lancaster, London and coming up to Southport for the weekend. It's hard for me to believe that she is only here for a week before flying back to the U.S. 

It's all go for the old fogeys!! Trouble is I think I might of gone ...