High Hurdles

In the end it was just a few emails. The first key one arrived soon after lunch on Monday 15th Feb. Stephen was en route to visit his Mum, I was headed for the pool. After four previous attempts, all of which failed due to others down the chain, finally contracts were exchanged on our Minehead house sale. I could tell Stephen was pleased. Even as the penultimate message arrived, the one agreeing to complete on Friday 19th,  before we got on with our days heading in different directions, he was pumping the air ("Yes!"). So when 'the' email arrived confirming exchange it felt huge. 

But come the final visit it wasn't the packing up that took the time. Efficient as ever, by Wednesday evening we had most of the pictures off the walls, cupboards emptied and ornaments wrapped before thoughts of dinner started creeping in. For the sake of nostalgia we decided we'd return to the same tapas bar we ate at the night we moved in 6 and a half years previously. By some miracle it seemed to have survived the ravages of the economic crisis so we walked up the high street with, if not high hopes, certainly a sense of appropriate 'coming full circle' enthusiasm. It was closed. <Sigh> The nearby pub menu we considered as a first alternative was great - if you wanted chips with everything (we didn't), and the Italian that we finally settled on turned out to be staffed by the slowest waitresses and the most unimaginative chefs in Somerset. Enough said. Disappointing. 

Thursday dawned dry and bright, the seagulls were in fine voice and a sense of finality was settling over us but with the car to pack and a fair bit of cleaning still to be done we were up and at it promptly. Just as well. Maybe we're too fussy, too thorough, or simply too proud but it was late lunchtime before we'd finished, and it was time to say goodbye. Little did I anticipate the flood of emotions that ensued. Strangely it wasn't for the end of the era, nor for the house itself (although I maintain it has a lovely feel and with more investment will make a wonderful family home), no, it was for some of the older furniture that I felt a sudden and overwhelming nostalgia. That pine king sized bed into which our toddlers were welcomed, the old leather sofa that teenaged Chip fell asleep on night after night and the scrubbed and much loved kitchen table that had seen everything from kiddies parties to finger painting and wallpaper pasting to baking binges. It was all just slightly overwhelming. We left a note, we toured the rooms, made our peace and we locked the door one last time.

The drive home (after a fabulous lunch at the lovely late-discovered Toucan) saw us return to 'looking-forward' mode. Of course there was still the final hurdle to get over but with completion set for Friday and nothing more we could do, we turned our backs on Minehead and headed home.

And there we have it. Friday 19th Feb 2016. Sale concluded. Another email forwarded, a quick call from work to Stephen at home, a hug on arrival for lunch and a swift movement of the funds into an investment account with a favourite dinner on the menu that night. Not much of a celebration but a huge relief and a small step forwards to our next adventure. The End.

Tibits on a Sunny Afternoon

Thursday 11th Feb. Time to dig out the first of Stephen's Christmas experience tickets. After a birthday lunch with Julie at The Baraset, I picked up Stephen and we popped over to Warwick Parkway, headed for London. Really broke a few technological boundaries today. First I booked our train tickets, online naturally, but had them delivered to my phone as QR codes .... Next I used my Ringgo account to pay for the car park, whilst on a moving train .... And on arrival at Marylebone used my contactless debit card to swipe my way through the tube turnstiles! Not a piece of paper in sight so far. Google maps on 4G then helped us find our way to Tibits, a highly recommended veggie/vegan restaurant in Heddon Street, just off Regent Street, that I'd found online. Fascinating place, great atmosphere, and where all food is sold by weight! We enjoyed a fabulous early supper and then walked along Regent Street, through Piccadilly Circus, passing Eros looking magnificent against the night sky, to the Harold Pinter Theatre to revel in Sunny Afternoon. This biopic musical of The Kinks and the life story of Ray and Dave Davis was the perfect combination for Stephen and I, and a lot of fun. Quick dash back to Marylebone with 5 minutes to spare before our return journey and home by shortly after midnight. 

Lots of fun.

Regent Street architecture, by night

The Plague House and Other Dismal Dwellings

It's February. Traditionally not a month I look forward to, relish much or want to dwell upon for any reason and this year it's arrived, like road-kill, in the bloody jaws of an already pretty miserable January. I succumbed to germ warfare 10 days ago and am only now crawling from under the flu-stone leaving poor Stephen dragging himself through the same hellish mire behind me. It's exhausting. Likewise weighing our collective spirits down is the heavy cloak of disappointment that has wrapped itself around us since yet another purchaser of the Minehead house declared himself 'fed up of waiting' and brought the whole chain crashing. As if we too were not entirely drained by treading water! If ever anyone deserved for this process to reach a positive conclusion it's Stephen who has worked tirelessly nudging, chasing, confirming and reconfirming. In addition we've debated, speculated, juggled, scheduled, hired, packed, loaded, unloaded, repacked, tried not to get excited, got excited, and then paid the price for getting excited - and this, the 4th time around. One has to believe such an elegant house will eventually find love again in the arms of someone who will restore her to her Edwardian glory, in a way we would (we promise) had not our future now presented a tantalisingly different, more spontaneous path down which we plan to walk. 

And so from one house suffering under the weight of tissues and cough drops and through whose door no visitors can be invited until we are freed from the shackles of 'the grand malaise' to another pining for a new adventure, may February hustle on by swiftly and blow the cobwebs firmly on their way. Amen. 

To Brizzle and Back ...

Kicking off our year of celebrations was never intended to be this way. I thought the first blog I wrote would be more 'momentous' somehow. But along came another weekend with no forward plans so yesterday, Saturday 16th Jan, we figured why not!? So we did. We drove to Bristol, or more specifically to St Nicholas Market, simply for lunch! The delay in exchange of contracts on our house in Minehead has had us 'on hold' since the start of the year and yet another small hiccough meant no chance of retrieving our few desired bits of furniture this weekend - again - and so with our new philosophy of 'time to have some fun' there was nothing stopping us. The result? A stroll round the multi-cultural food market, an amazingly cheap yet hearty Moroccan meal, under the silk-adorned canopy of a street 'tent' finished off with Arabian coffee and delicious sweet mint tea served in a silver pot, and later a chunk of chocolate tiffin. Happy days. 

We also picked up a great map of Brirish Columbia and a guide book for Vancouver and Victoria meaning Stephen spent a happy hour later plotting our route for the summer. He's done such a brilliant job negotiating our holiday and now the deposit is paid we can really start to look forward to that ultimate adventure. 

But for now Brizzle will do nicely thank you. Fun times.

The Energy Tree, Millennium Square