Friday 6th July, 2012

I have had my second curtailed week in a row so I feel the need to explain myself. Whilst it may not have surprised you, my repeated absences probably havn't shown me in the best light to our new colleagues who have joined us from RBS. Being serious for a moment though, everyone here has been fantastically supportive and helpful. My mother was taken ill as she was travelling down south with my father to visit my brother in Wiltshire. They were staying in a hotel just north of Birmingham when she developed chest pains early on Tuesday morning. Perhaps you havn't met my mother, but she is quite a piece of work. In considerable pain, she was being looked after by an understandably slightly frazzled, young hotel receptionist while they waited for the ambulance to arrive. "Don't worry, don't worry" my mother tells me the girl said to her. "Take slow deep breaths. Like this..... Breath in.......breath out......breath in......Now bring your legs up a bit dear" At which point my mother apparently couldn't resist retorting, through gritted teeth "I'm having a heart attack you know, not giving birth!" Very fortuitously one of England's newest hospitals was close to hand and having been taken there in an ambulance, within minutes she was being attended to and, fingers crossed, all is now well thank goodness. She'll be leaving this morning and heading home to Elie, Fife. Wolverhampton. Now there's a place I had not been to before and at the risk of alienating myself with the large number of my clients who will now no doubt reveal that's where they come from, it's not a place I need to visit again. You know when you go somewhere for the first time and it's rainy and grey? You kind of feel you should give it the benefit of the doubt and only judge it when the sun comes out. No need to bother with that when it comes to Wolverhampton. What a dump. Mind you, our opinion of the place was not helped by the Ely House Hotel which I booked my father and I into on Tuesday night. I liked the name obviously and it had looked pretty smart on the website, but as Hen likes to say....Never judge a book by its cover. To be fair to me, I suspect there were probably worse hotels about and it did have a reasonable selection of malt whisky. Anyway, if you were in hospital in Wolverhampton, feeling a touch under the weather, I suspect this would perk you up......written on the back of the home made get well card that my mother received, a message from our 11 year old daughter. Dear Grannie, I hope you are not to badly ill, poor you!! And not even in your own comforting surroundings. I don't feel perfect to, although I'm sure your ailment is a bit worse than a cold. Please get better soon and come to see us. Lots of love, Lottie xxx OK...she can't spell but quite sweet! Changing the subject Hen is in France for yet another holiday at the parents-in-law pad in Gascony. This time, rather than lounging about the pool in what inevitably proves to be a futile attempt to get a suntan, the highlight she tells me is the prospect of a visit to Disneyland Paris on the return trip. Hen absolutely hates scary, "fun" rides. Wild horses could not drag her to Big Thunder Mountain. But she has agreed to go to Disneyland, can't wait actually, on the promise that she is allowed to dress up as a real live sparkly, pink Princess in order to cavort on equal terms with Mickey and Minnie Mouse. It's a worry. The girl is going to be 20 in a few weeks time.