Am I patient?

 It turns out the food and drink festival is on this coming Saturday, not yesterday, I got the date wrong.  Husband was delighted at that - he always gets dates, appointments and times wrong so gleefully and smugly told me "See, it's not just me!" 😒  I get something wrong once, he does it all the time 😜

Some of you have said I must have oodles of patience.....I wouldn't ever have said before that I was a particularly patient person, the opposite in fact.  But yes, in dealing with husband on a daily basis I have to be extremely patient.  For instance, this morning he was doing his weekly dosette box pill fill up - he does it, at his insistence, with me supervising.  He's actually pretty good at getting all the pills sorted into the twice daily little boxes, with the occasional slip up which I help him to sort out.  What he has trouble with though is actually getting the pills out of their packets safely - he tends to ping the pills around and every Sunday, 2 or 3 end up on the floor, with both of us scrabbling around on the floor looking for them.  Which worries me, as I'm always concerned if we can't find one, Betty might, and I don't want her eating random human pills!  About a month ago, I bought husband a gadget for extracting pills safely from packets, it's a bit like a stapler with a container that the pill falls safely into.  Well, that's the theory, and it does actually work quite well, although is a bit fiddly to use.  Husband can't stand anything fiddly though, so now refuses to use it, nor will he let me do it for him.  He's extremely obstinate, as I've said before, if he doesn't want to do something then he won't, and there's absolutely no budging him.

He asked me this morning what one of his pills is for - it's Dapagliflozin, one of his heart pills, it's a mild diuretic and helps lower blood pressure and ease the heart's load.....it's also a diabetes medication, I take Empagliflozin for my diabetes, it's in the same family as the Dapa.  Well, husband then insisted it was for his diabetes (he's only borderline diabetic and takes no medication for it), I said no, it's for his heart.  So, as is his custom, he then began an argument insisting adamantly that he was given it for diabetes.  No he wasn't, the GP - on the advice of his cardiologist - prescribed it for his heart.....I was there in the surgery with him at the time, so I know!  This is where my patience comes in - husband is so bloody-minded, when he thinks he's right about something he is so scathing and talks down to me, treating me as if I'm an idiot.  It takes all of my restraint and tolerance not to do what I really feel like doing - which is to whack him round the ear with a frying pan and walk out the door.  Instead, I just have to walk away, seething inside.....so yes I guess you could say I'm very patient now.

It's quite upsetting, the man I've loved since I was 21 and married at 23 would never, had never treated me like that up until a couple of years ago - that man doesn't exist anymore, which is so sad.

The oppressive heat and humidity has gone, it's beautifully fresh - and even slightly cool - today.  Such a relief, my body's not built for hot humid temperatures.  Once again, we've got a week with no medical appointments....I said that last week though and we ended up with a last-minute podiatry appointment for husband.  Oh, just remembered, husband's key worker is due to ring for a phone appointment on Wednesday.  I suppose it's nice that they're monitoring his mental state, albeit on the phone once a month, but I really don't think it's much use.  Whilst she's nice enough, seems caring and very earnestly asks questions about how he's feeling and we're both coping, the problem is she insists on speaking to both of us at the same time, on speakerphone.  Which means husband talks over me, as usual, I hardly get a chance to say anything, and in any case I have to be careful about what I say, as if I say something husband doesn't like or disagrees with, it rebounds on me as he has a right go at me later once the call has ended.

Too hot for ice cream!

 Well, no ice cream yesterday, nor the frozen fish I wanted - all of the supermarket's freezers were roped off with notices pinned on them saying the food was dangerous to eat as the freezers were out of order.  A lot of their chiller cabinets holding the fresh food were empty too - same reason, chillers broken down.  A staff member said the chiller and freezer cabinets just couldn't cope with the heat.  Apparently, it was the same with all their freezers in the stock room out the back, they were going to have to discard ALL of their frozen food....that's an awful lot of food to throw away!  Terrible isn't it, but of course they have to be safe, if someone got ill as a result of eating food from a freezer that had broken down, the store would be in big trouble.  At least two other food stores in town had the same problems, according to local social media.  Makes you wonder how other countries that generally have hotter temperatures than ours cope - I guess they're more geared up for it, as the heat is normal for them.  But it looks like these extremes of temperatures/weather conditions are becoming normal for this country too, so it's time to get their acts together I think.

The car journey to and from husband's podiatry appointment in Taunton yesterday afternoon was deeply unpleasant, traffic jams and boiling hot temperatures, 32 deg according to the car thermometer.  And then when we got there, it was a pay and display car park with machines that didn't accept cards, it was a pay by phone thing which I'd never used before, I figured it out though.  It did accept coins (correct money only, no change given) but husband had no cash at all and I only had 40p(!!) as I almost never use cash nowadays.  If husband had been on his own he'd have been completely flummoxed.  I guess that's a lesson to always ensure we have some coins in the car.  Honestly, this cashless society is a downright nuisance at times.  The podiatrist said that husband wears the wrong shoes, almost all his shoes are slip ons which the podiatrist said don't stop his feet from sliding forwards inside them when he's walking, causing his toes to bunch up at the front.  He said he should ideally wear lace ups, which husband finds difficult to do up because bending over causes him to become breathless and dizzy.  The chap did say that velcro fastening ones would be a reasonable alternative.  Incidentally, husband's cardiac nurse told him ages ago that instead of bending over to do up his shoes, he should bring his feet up towards him, i.e. put his foot up on a stool, so he doesn't have to bend over so far.  Does he do it though?  No of course he doesn't, despite me reminding him umpteen times. 🙄

It's noticeably cooler this morning and was a much more comfortable night, thank goodness, it's still warm but not blisteringly hot and humid, breezy too which is nice.  There's a food and drink festival on at the seafront today, basically local food and drink producers selling very nice but also very expensive wares - we'll go and look anyway.  I'd better get some cash out of a machine on the way there, just in case!

We had a phone call from husband's sister yesterday, the one with lung cancer (he has 4 sisters and 3 brothers still living).  She and her daughter are coming down for 3 nights next month, daughter will be driving, they're staying in the Premier Inn less than 2 miles away so will be spending most of every day with us.  Being realistic, it's likely to be the last time husband and his sister see each other - as her illness progresses she won't be coming down all this way (around 175 miles), nor is husband able to drive that distance either.  So we'll have to make the most of this visit.  And then his daughter and son in law are coming down for a long weekend in August, it's always nice to see them.

Aggravation all round

 Last night was the worst one this year, it was incredibly hot and sticky, Betty and I were both suffering.  Poor thing, she just couldn't settle, was very restless and prowling around, panting a lot, throwing herself down on her 2 beds (1 in the lounge, the other in my bedroom), her cool mat, the sofa, my bed, the floors.  I had the fan on in my bedroom but it's only a small one and not very powerful, so in the end we both went in the lounge and I switched the big fan on and opened a couple of windows.  I got out the cloths I'd earlier wrung out in cold water and put in plastic bags in the fridge, I had one round my neck, the other I spread over Betty as she was lying on her cool mat.  Trouble is, she won't stay still for long enough, she was up and down constantly, so the cloth kept falling off.  I lay in husband's recliner chair for a while, then a thunderstorm started up around midnight, which unnerved Betty even more - fortunately, it was much quieter and a lot less violent than the one the other day, just a few claps of thunder, a bit of lightning and a few showers that went on for an hour or so.  Eventually, we both went back to my bedroom and endured a very restless night.  It is a bit cooler so far this morning, although still sticky.  Betty does drink water often, I make sure of that.  She seems ok right now, she's sleeping as she's clearly very tired (I know the feeling!).  She's not eaten her breakfast but that's ok, I'm sure she doesn't feel like eating right now, nor do I.

Husband had a phone call late yesterday afternoon, offering him a cancellation appointment for podiatry for this afternoon (he's had trouble with his feet for years, it's flared up again).  Unfortunately, the appointment is at a clinic in Taunton, so a blinking 45-50 minute drive on a hot day again.  Such a blimmin nuisance, I don't know why they can't hold the clinics in the Minehead hospital, instead of forcing us to go on long journeys - which eventually we won't be able to do.

The upside of having to go out this afternoon is that it'll give us a break from the constant racket going on next door.  The builders arrived early again, there's been a cement mixer going non-stop since 7.30 this morning, along with metallic clanking noises as the scaffolding is going up.  They're not having professional scaffolders, neighbour Mr X bought a vanload of second hand scaffolding and he and his brother are erecting it themselves.  I have no idea if they're trained or experienced at it, I presume not as they took all day yesterday to erect just the gable end scaffolding, whereas professional scaffolders would have the whole lot done in a day.  Let's hope for their sakes it's safe!  And all the blokes are shouting to each other again, to be heard above all the noise.  Before anyone says it, I do know that we could report the noise and flagrant disregard for time starts to the Council, but I'm not going to do that for 2 reasons:  1)  We have to live with our neighbours in harmony for years to come, and 2)  If the Council did put a restriction on their working hours, then the work would take even longer to complete.  So we just have to put up with it, even though it means we cannot sit out in our garden for probably the whole of the summer.  And we thought we were moving to a lovely peaceful retirement community!!

We're popping out to the supermarket now for a top up shop of fresh stuff (and a bit of ear relief!).  I think I'll buy a tub of nice ice cream - not on my low Fodmap diet but I've pretty much stuck to it for more than 2 weeks now, and I think we deserve a treat!

Too hot to think, let alone do anything

 We're all suffering the effects of the heat now, well myself and Betty more so than husband, he likes the hot weather but still has to be careful.  I have to remind him to keep drinking water or squash, he doesn't drink enough, especially since he sweats excessively in this heat.  I've also suggested he stays indoors today, since we're on red alert for high temperatures.  Betty had a short walk at 7 am, for the past few days that's been her one and only walk each day, the rest of the time she goes for a wee on the lawn at the front of the house, the paved areas and gravel in our back garden are far too hot for her.  We have the fans going, windows open and curtains closed, it's actually not too bad indoors although it'll probably be much worse this afternoon.  Betty has, for the last couple of days, actually been lying on her cool mat, thankfully.  If it was bigger I think I'd join her 😂.  Thank goodness it'll be much cooler tomorrow, this heat has done me in, when I got up just after 6 this morning I felt like a hot, sweaty, sticky, headachy mess - a cool shower made me feel much better.  Oh, and husband was out with Betty, so no chance of the shower water stopping!  We're forecast thunderstorms late tonight.

One of the good things about having the fans going all day is that it helps to mask the constant noise from the building works next door!

I need some shopping, but might get it delivered for a change, I certainly don't feel like going at the moment.  Actually, it could wait a few days, we have plenty of food in, just getting a bit low on fresh fruit and veggies, and of course it's going to be cooler from tomorrow.  So actually we might go on Sunday morning, the supermarket is usually quiet then.

Nothing else to say, sorry, it's too hot to do anything so therefore nothing to write about!

Standing my ground, and the lovely trellis

 It's exceedingly noisy here this morning, there's a big cement lorry parked right beside our bungalow with the engine running and the cement mixer tank revolving.  The chief builder is riding up and down in a dumper truck thing, collecting several loads of cement from the lorry then transporting it to the building job nearby, his truck beeps loudly all the time.  There are several more builders, plus neighbour Mr X and his brother all standing there watching and shouting to each other to be heard above all the din.  It's bedlam.  Good start to the day 😒

Yesterday evening husband and I had words, honestly that man is the most argumentative and obstinate man I know.  Normally when he's got a bee in his bonnet about something and is determined to insist he's right and I'm wrong, I just give in and walk away - even if I'm right, it's really not worth the hassle to argue about things with him, he will not relent or admit that he may be wrong.  I went for a shower in the evening....the water kept going off, each time I pressed the button it would flow for about 10 seconds and then stop again, we've had this problem before (although it only seems to happen when it's me showering and not husband!).  Every time the water shut off, I could hear husband running taps in the kitchen, which is right next to the bathroom.  The shower water only started flowing properly again once husband had turned off the taps in the kitchen (he was washing up).  When I came out of the shower I told husband what had happened, he immediately said "No, that shouldn't happen", I said well it did.  Once again he insisted it couldn't happen, he said it 2 or 3 times.  As I said, normally I give in for the sake of peace but this time I thought no I'm not going to, he cannot continue to think that he is always right.  So I said whether it couldn't or shouldn't happen was irrelevant, the fact was it WAS happening and that was that.  I invited him to go and run the shower whilst I ran the taps in the kitchen, he just shrugged and wouldn't do it.  I think the next time he's in the shower I'll turn on the kitchen sink taps, just to show him that it DOES happen.  It'll be sod's law that it won't happen then! 😂😜

We've finished off putting up the fence trellis panels, it looks good and gives us a much needed extra 12" of height along the top of the fence.  Once the ivy and other climbing plants grow up onto the trellis, we'll have so much more privacy, I'm very pleased with it.

The trellis panels don't all match, the shop didn't have enough of the ones I liked so we had to buy a mixture of two different ones - doesn't matter to me, I've never been one for having everything perfect and matchy-matchy.  Once they're covered with climbing plants it won't be noticeable anyway.  We're not going outside again for the rest of the day, it's already too hot out there.  Roll on Friday when the temperature comes down to a more reasonable 24 deg.

I'm making a Spanish omelette to have with salad for today and tomorrow, there are some veggies that need using up so the omelette will be perfect for that.  I'll cook it in the Ninja.

Spectacular

 We had the most spectacular thunderstorm late yesterday afternoon, loud thunderclaps and lots of very bright lightning flashes coming literally every few seconds, so the storm must have been (and stayed) right overhead, for about 40 minutes.  Our electricity and internet went off, although came back on quite quickly, some of the TV channels were missing for about 30 mins though, much to husband's disgust.  At least the garden got a good watering and it freshened the air up, albeit briefly.  Betty hates storms and was quite disturbed, her eyes were huge, she was whimpering and kept trying to hide behind my legs or underneath my chair.  I reassure her but don't make too much of a fuss about it, I don't want her to think it's a big problem.  I remember years ago when we were kids, mum used to run round the house in a panic switching everything electrical off and pulling all the plugs out.

Husband realised (too late) yesterday during the storm that he'd left all the car windows wide open from when he went out in the morning.  So the inside of the car, as well as the outside (he almost never washes our car) got a good soaking 😒.  He's got the car doors open now, the seats are still wet from yesterday.

I had a few things to do indoors yesterday morning but told husband we'd go outside to start putting up the trellis panels afterwards.  He wanted to get straight on with it though, so I said I'd be out as soon as possible and told him to be careful and take regular breaks.  After half an hour I went out to tell him to take a break and come in for a cold drink, which he did very reluctantly.  A short while later I saw from the kitchen window that he was leaning against the fence, bent over with his head down, clearly unwell, I immediately went and got him inside.  He insisted he didn't have chest pains but felt nauseous and dizzy, I got him another glass of water and made him go and lie down in his room.  I think he just overdid things, he won't listen to me, goes at everything like a bull in a china shop and forgets that he simply cannot do the same things he did 20 years ago, he's an idiot at times.  He says he feels fine this morning and wants to carry on, I've told him he's not to start until I go out there with him, and we'll only be working for an hour or so.  

The builders were here and banging away at 07.30 this morning, yes it's a bit irritating but it's not like they woke us up, I'd got up at 6 and husband about half an hour later.  Our next door neighbours, however, aren't early risers so I don't suppose they're best pleased.  I just think perhaps the builders want to get finished earlier today before it gets too baking hot this afternoon....and maybe if they get cracking even earlier then the job will be finished sooner.  It's a big job though, converting an ancient single storey stone barn into a 2-storey holiday home, so it's not like they're going to be finished anytime soon.  So far they seem to have dug out all the floor inside and are in the process of blocking up one of the existing doorways and creating a new doorway.  

Right, husband's had his breakfast (he's ready to eat almost as soon as he's got out of bed), we're both washed and dressed, Betty's been walked and had her breakfast, so it's time for another coffee before going outside to carry on with the fencing.

Salads all week

 I've just put washing out and it's already too hot for me out there, thankfully the bungalow stays fairly cool, especially with windows open and curtains shut.  Husband said he was going to the gym this morning but has since changed his mind, he's gone off into town to buy some wood ready for putting up the fence trellis panels.  We'll have to do this work fairly early in the morning this week, to avoid the excessive heat later.  I want the trellis panels put up this week as yesterday we heard neighbour Mr X telling someone that the building work is "all systems go" from now on, which means it'll be noisy.  So far it's been sporadic, with generally only one man doing any work, as the builders are still currently finishing off another building job nearby....that job looks to be almost completed so I guess all of them (3 blokes I think, plus Mr X and his brother doing the labouring on odd days throughout the week) will be here imminently.  If it gets too noisy at any time, then we'll take Betty and go out in the car somewhere - preferably up on the moor where there are lots of trees for shade!

I'm not doing much, if any, cooking during this week's excessive heat - perhaps an omelette or 2 or boiling some of our homegrown new potatoes but that's about it, salads all week.  Husband's having cottage pie tonight, his choice, I suggested he have a salad with it but he wants baked beans.  I'm having a beetroot and feta salad today, tinned salmon tomorrow.  I do love salmon, whether it be tinned, fresh or smoked, it's my favourite fish.

Betty does like to lie outside in the sun but is pretty sensible, after 5 or 10 minutes she either moves into a shady spot or comes indoors.  We do have a cool mat for her but she rarely lays on it, she might sometimes rest her head on it!  

I've been watching the Jilly Cooper series, Rivals, on catch up TV, I don't know why I missed it the first time around....it probably clashed with something husband wanted to watch.  I read all the Jilly Cooper books years ago so I know the story well.  A few things about the series strike me - firstly, I never realised Danny Dyer was such a good actor, I only really know him from Eastenders and appearing on game shows, where he basically just messes around.  David Tennant is excellent too.  And the smoking - my word, seems like virtually everybody was a chain smoker back then.  I smoked myself, although wasn't a heavy smoker, 10 a day usually, and I gave up about 30 years ago.  The rampant sexism is a bit hard to watch sometimes, especially when a young female character was raped (by a clergyman) and then persuaded (by David Tennant's boss character) to cover it up in case it hurt the franchise.  Have things changed all that much nowadays?  I know it's talked about more and there's the 'Me Too' thing, but I think some older men do still have sexist attitudes, as that's how it was back then and some of them haven't changed - the likes of Jim Davidson spring to mind.  It seems also that there's a new generation of young men with a terrible attitude towards young women, fuelled by them watching Tiktok videos put out by that awful man Andrew Tate (seemingly a millionaire but what he actually does I don't know) who's clearly misogynistic, and the equally awful Tommy Robinson, basically a rent-a-gob.

Well, enough of that, I'm off to plan a week's menu of salads!