🦞 The Lockdown Gang still chatting 🦞

It really is so good to hear from Kaimoana. I do hope the new place with it's sunny veranda starts to feel a little like home soon.

I find GN very frustrating in that there's no way to change the text size or font to make it easier for us to read. There must be others who would appreciate a larger text size especially.

Just popping in to wish everyone well.
Busy day today, even busier tomorrow with admin, setting up meetings, ringing the hospital to find out exactly what this 24 hour ambulatory cardiac monitor will involve and whether I really have to get the blessed machine back to them by 08.30 the next day.
08.30?😳 For a retiree?🤷‍♀️

Then off to Strength and Balance, where I feel positively youthful and relatively supple for an hour of my life once a week.
Precious times😆

Did anyone get my previous message? Ìneed help to get back into the covid...lockdoŵn section

What do you need, Kaimoana?
You are here now, in the covid lockdown section!
Hooray!

Here we all are! Kaimoana

Once again Im confused - doesnt take much! Am I in the covid lockdown section and if so can I contact Kaimoana and will she be able to read it??!
Ixion I used to do a sort of Strength and Balance class and it just made me knackered! Dont think Ive felt youthful and supple since I was 16!!
Lovely sunny day in Norfolk after a very misty start. Having a quiet day today after several days of visitors which has been lovely but tiring.

Jan16 the whole of this chat is under the coronavirus section of the forums.
It's where it was originally understand.. before I came along.

Oh sorry Kaimoana haven’t seen previous message. Yes the Lockdown gang are under coronavirus because that’s what we were. Locked down during the virus. Amazing we’re still going.
Been out today for a lovely walk in beautiful gardens. Done more walking than I have for ages and can hardly move now. Have a good weekend all. Xx

I did send a short pm to Kaimoana in the hope she can read it.

I too am doing a Council funded Strength and Balance course. I really must do the exercises! It does help I think, but I missed two while I was away and the last one was cancelled. I must get a nice thick exercise mat as apparently the next steps are floor exercises and lessons in getting up!

Today I spent in Fakenham Eye Clinic and being driven home (via coffee and cake shop) after having my right eye lasered as things have got a bit misty after the cataract operation. Hopefully successfully so things on the starboard side aren't as fogged up. Still waiting for the improvement. 4-6 hours they said.

Good news.
My mother-in-law's house is apparently sold now.
The buyer has given up on some of the searches.
So
😱😱😱
All is suddenly in order.
Thursday i was told 20 working days. But now they want to complete quickly... 9th November.
😬😬😬

Still full of stuff as may not have sold.
Very very weary.

That's wonderful news 😀😊 NotSpaghetti if a bit sudden! I can imagine how weary you are.

I had a second viewing of the house I quite like, taking my df. He thinks it's very small. The rooms are small and the family there are so tidy! I started to have doubts about it. It's suburban if you know what I mean. All the tidy gardens in the street so I fear I wouldn't fit in. Also the stairs are steep and there is no loo downstairs. 😕

Nfk I do hope the laser treatment works for you!
Well done Doodle with the walking.
Love to Kaimoana if she's reading this.

Jan. I know what you mean by being knackered by the exercise classes.

My Helper left today to go to her next place in England and I am relieved. It wasn't a good idea to have someone new when I am in this odd limbo state.
She did make apple juice and process apples but kept the strangest hours. She kept telling me how lucky I was. I'm not sure I feel particularly lucky.

Look who I found in the bath!

Grammaretto is it a house a stairlift could be put in if necessary. I know you don’t need as many rooms as you r got now but you are used to having space. Would you cope with the small rooms do you think.
So difficult to find the perfect place. Hope it works out for you.
Ooh I don’t like spiders. Mind you it is Halloween 🎃
Good news Notspaghetti
NFK hope your eye is better now.

Went to see my first ballet today. Snow Queen. I loved it.

Oh grammaretto how terrible… what a decision!

I have ruled out houses with small rooms that couldn’t be “knocked through”, also houses on perfect estates and anything suburban as I don’t want my lawn or hedging etc “watched” growing by too tidy neighbours…. And I’m hostile to lean-to type “sunrooms”…

I’ve been looking at all the different floor plans and don’t think I can manage under a certain size either to be honest.
I haven’t said this out loud but it’s frankly better to stay put and endure the (known) problems here than to move for the sake of it.

It’s a struggle to find things in our price range with a decent garden.
For the future-proofing I’d want a downstairs loo for daytime as stairlifts are quite slow, so if there wasn’t one I’d have to budget to put one in.
And I also need a room for a studio. I’ve looked at building a dedicated workroom in the garden but it’s more expensive than you’d think.

I have seen some quite ok barn conversions - but they all turn out to be a part-barn in a sort-of complex. And I find the way they split the spaces up quite odd. They only ever have pocket handkerchief gardens too.

notspaghetti Grammaretto has a studio. Perhaps you should move in with her and solve both your problems.🤣

I would too, but I don't like what Grammaretto finds in the bath😱

It was a daddy long legs, ixion so harmless I'm told 😲
I've ruled out barn conversions too NotSpaghetti but because they are in rural areas and usually far from bus stops which is another of my must haves

Staying put is not an option now.

I saw a rather nice film tonight "The Choral" written by Alan Bennett about a Yorkshire choir in the First World War.

When I saw it was described as a comedy but set in 1916, I was intrigued.

The Ballet sounds great. Doodle.
I've booked a Christmas show to take the DGDs but couldn't get panto tickets as they were sold out! How are other people so efficient?

Grammaretto - If the stairs are steep and there's nowhere to put a stairlift - walk away! It's not just the width of the stair but where it will park at the top and bottom. Although Stiltz Lifts might be an answer.

Have you tried cutting out shapes of the furniture you want to take so you can draw a plan of any prospective home and see if said furniture will fit? See if the quarts will fit into the pint pot?

Like NotSpagetti I've decided to stay put. Well, I did look for a bungalow but the competition around here is fierce and the nice ones get snapped up by people who've already sold, living in rented and ready to move quickly. So, I've changed the rooms around and now live downstairs. It seems such a waste, but the upstairs does get used when family come and I still have my little playroom (room with a view where I dabble in watercolours) up there. And it's saving on heating bills. I think. Octopus have just told me I need to raise my DD.

Thank you for asking and my eye lasering last week went smoothly and I can see clearly out of both eyes. No more foggy eye! It was a very speedy experience with lots of red fireworks to watch as the bright laser zapped the thick cells which had grown. I may well need to have it done again in the future but it holds no fear now.

I'm so pleased you enjoyed your ballet Doodle. I love it too especially the traditional ones.

As long as I can put a downstairs loo in, I think the house will work. I don't need a stairlift yet and I have 4 flights of stairs now to keep me fit.

The skip left today. I thought it was full but if I had broken everything down I could have squeezed in twice as much according to the driver 😟
He added a mattress before it left which I had hauled downstairs. I think everything else not coming with me can be taken by the house clearance company.

I did all the measurements of rooms and furniture for the house I lost but it had a garage and a conservatory. This has neither.
It does have a floored attic with ladder but I can't stuff furniture up there 😂

I have several more weeks to go before anything is signed and sealed. I may have to go into Sparky's flat after all.

I am glad your eye surgery went well Nfk
That must be a relief.

I’m sure you DGDs will love the Christmas show Grammaretto. There were quite a few children at the ballet but I’m not sure what they would have made of it all,
If you do have to move out is renting somewhere an option rather than buying a place that might not be what you really want? It’s very hard to scale down especially when you’re used to such a big house and grounds.
Sorry I didn’t mean to imply you needed a stair lift just that if the time arose would one fit in the house. A downstairs loo would be a big plus.
NFK glad the layering went well and things are better. Good you can manage to live in your downstairs. DH and I moved to a flat with a lift for the very reason it was all on one level. Thank goodness we did because after his accident when he couldn’t walk I don’t know how we’d have managed as he wouldn’t have been able to use a stairlift either.

My DMiL moved in with her other DS when it was impossible to look after her in her own house. A stairlift was fitted from his basement flat up to the ground floor of the 18th century Georgian house - now subdivided . It is a bendy staircase but it was manageable. She died a few months later but my DBiL is leaving the stairlift for his own old age!

I've been invited to Cambridge this weekend to meet up with my siblings.

I'm rather excited 😊 and have booked the train. This is what they mean when they say "Look after yourself" 😍 Doodle

Now I must back out of several weekend commitments.

Oh how lovely to be invited to meet up with your siblings Grammaretto Certainly an opportunity not to be missed and a train ride too,
Have a lovely time. Sounds exciting.
Been doing housework today but treats tomorrow. Lucy st a Chinese restaurant to celebrate friends 80th

I hope you enjoyed the Chinese meal. Doodle

I must get packed and ready to travel tomorrow. It's a bit later in the day so I don't have to rush, thankfully.

The downside is that most of the train journey will be in darkness.

No more house news to report. I'm waiting until a date is suggested for the exchange of missives.

I hope I won't need to move my belongings into storage and myself into storage too
rented accommodation.

I'll be hiding from fireworks tonight probably along with the dogs.

Several big/important birthdays coming up within the family so I am racking my brain for ideas. I have now given in and asked them. 😂

I hope all Lobstars are doing ok.

Hope you enjoyed your celebratory meal, Doodle. How much nicer, these days, not to have to get dolled up geared up to dinners out, especially at this time of year, when a warm and undemanding night in is much more preferable!

Safe and enjoyable trip, Grammaretto. What a lovely city Cambridge is😍.
I have signed up, more in hope than expectation, to a website featuring vacant rooms in university residences, Oxford, Cambridge and London and am promising myself a trip and stay in the New Year.

I hope you don't have to follow your goods and chattels into storage anytime soon, but I think I share the concern of fellow 🦞s that a sideways move into something rented is preferable to moving to a place that you have to learn to love. Are there any less 'conventional' properties on the market that might enable you to continue potting with relative ease?

Pleased your lasering went well, NfD. Might I ask how long ago you had your initial op? I had mine done around 8 years ago (I wept when my optician told me I needed it - encroaching old age and all that😟) and now am just wondering whether my eyes might deteriorate too.

Jan, is Theo safely tucked up away from the excitement of Bonfire Night?
Hopefully, unlike Barney, who may later regret his show of bravado on exiting after his evening meal.
We shall await his return!
Stupid boy.

Hope you have a good journey Grammaretto shame the train trip will be in the dark. I quite like a train journey. So much more comfortable than coach or bus. I hope you don’t need to pur yourself in storage too 🤣
ixion hope Barney is safely inside now. Very little in the way of fireworks here. Yes mal was lovely thank you. Lots of laughter.