Happy New Year
Hello, and a happy New Year to you. I’m back after my Christmas Week off and looking forward to the year ahead. I’m not one of those blogs that spends an entire two weeks looking back over what happened last year, although I think I did that the other day, so instead, let’s have a catch-up.
I’ve been very quiet over the last week, staying at home, having great times with the godboys and their mum, writing when not sitting on the sofa eating Quality Street or checking out the gifts I was given on Christmas Day. We’ve also been busy revamping our offices. Mine is getting there, I am waiting for the new computer desk and chair, and a cabinet and then, all I need to do if find decent curtains and perhaps a new light fitting and I can reveal it. Neil is also sorting out his room which is currently a bit bare and finding him a proper desk, and perhaps some carpet is next on the agenda. I ordered a tailor-made piece of carpet for my room from Christalo towards the back of the town square, and it arrived a few days later from Athens. Because it’s a bit plush (for me) I feel I can now call my office a study. I just need a slowly ticking clock, a drinks cabinet and some very worthy leather-back books on shelves and the fantasy will be complete.
I know you want a weather update, but there’s not a lot to update you with. Temperatures have been down to eight degrees inside and out, the little meter wheel is whizzing around when all three heaters are on, and I daren’t look when I also have the oven and kettle going, but we manage to stay warm enough, sometimes under blankets on the sofa. I do find I’m up and at my desk before it gets light and it’s often a surprise to emerge from the ‘study’ to find it’s daylight, sunny and almost warm in the sun. The shutters are closed, you see, to help keep the heat in. Today photos were taken the other morning, the first time I’d been on the balcony since before Christmas.
And as for the year ahead… Well, no trips are planned apart from our annual health-check MOT in Rhodes in March or April and a visit to Scotland for our son’s wedding in November. If I can, I will go to Tilos or somewhere equally as peaceful for a week to do my writing retreat, and I am spending a couple of days in Athens with mother in September when she is on her way to Symi. (Note: must check out the hotels in the village for prices before long.) We have, though, put down a deposit on a trip for early 2020 when we will be taking a train trip – you know how I am with train journeys. This one will be to Vancouver, via London. The train actually starts in Toronto, but we will fit in a couple of days either side in the yUK (if we are allowed in, being displaced migrants from that country with no rights to vote in it and so on, but let’s not get into all that so early in the year). Which means, plenty to look forward to, including the falling apart of the yUK, and that’s without the friends and family who will be returning for their Symi holidays and trips in the summer.
