Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 88 Comments

A trip to a castle

I was looking for batteries. Why are batteries so pesky. You spend most of the year cursing who many batteries you find on shelves, pockets and cupboards. But when you actually need them, the little blighters hide. When you do find them you can guarantee that they are the wrong size. Anyway I was looking for batteries with absolutely no success then ….

An old and forgotten box of old photos. It’s times like this that I am so happy that I had a habit of taking too many pics. This box was from a holiday we had way before our son was born. We arranged a last minute week long trip to Northumberland in the North of England. For those who don’t know England that well – find the most northerly English city (Newcastle). The bit above this city and all the way to the Scottish border is Northumberland. It’s a beautiful and often desolate place. With few large towns, rolling hills, moors and some of the countries finest castles.

For the week we rented an old Gypsy Cottage. The weather was so Northumberland like. Very windy, cold and often exceedingly damp. Today’s photographic memory trip was a day trip we had during that lovely week. A trip to Dunstanburgh Castle.

It’s a stunning castle ruins set right on the windswept North Sea coast. To get to it you park up in a small fishing village and walk along the beach. The walk started wet and basically added increasing amounts of water to the mix. The photos brought the memories flooding back. Wow we got wet.

It was a wonderful day. We had the place to ourselves. Hours spent walking along the coast, scrambling over history and even time for sand castle building. Finally we got back to the fishing village and looked round the local fish smoking business. It would have been rude not to sample the produce and chips. Then it was back to the cottage to a roaring fire and an attempt to dry out. Happy Days.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 133 Comments

First rant of the month and then the garden beach

Before anyone says anything this photo was NOT today and not 2020……

It’s a bizarre country which I live in.

A place where British war time spirit and a stiff up lip is the way to defeat this unseen enemy – well that’s what our newspapers are claiming. No I think you will find that it’s actually antibodies and vaccines that will do that. Self distancing will help dampen the curve but on its own it will not do the job.

A country which for 10 years has invested heavily in academic testing for an increasingly younger range of school kids. The only principle in UK education is meeting government targets by testing millions of kids, week after week. Test, test, test. Yet the same Government can’t see the importance of testing when it applies to a pandemic. They can’t even provide virus tests for our brave medics and front line carers. Actually the can’t even provide the appropriate protective kit to all our nurses. Suddenly we have a mad scramble for kit, tests and ventilators. It’s not as if the Government didn’t know. Three years ago a study reported to the then Government on how poorly prepared the country was for a pandemic. The Government (including many in the current cabinet) decided to bury the report.

That’s probably why the UK is soon going to have the worst pandemic mortality rate in Europe.

Deep deep sigh and divert gaze to domestic matters.

“Dad would you mind if I didn’t do any revision this week for the school tests. Not sure I’m in the right frame of mind for it.”

Given the current climate why on earth is the school doing exams. Oh I forgot – it’s government policy. Can we just give the kids a break. Especially as the tests are based on such a narrow educational range. It’s more about proving to kids what they don’t know and spotlighting their individual weaknesses. What about letting kids show what they are good at, what they do know.

“Ok Son that’s fine with me. When you feel the revision force is with you then if you want to, then do some. If it’s not then just have FUN.”

And that’s what we did. We had to abandon the planned eat some whip cream while bouncing on the trampoline competition. The pigeons who have adopted our garden have now decided to build a nest right next to the trampoline AND it now has eggs. So we opted for plan b and c. Try to make some homemade ice cream. Followed by setting up our very own beach. In the garage I found a couple of old bags of play sand. So that was emptied onto the little patio and the old kiddies paddling pool was filled with water. Shorts and suncream on. An MP3 file of seaside bird and animal sounds was played on my portable music player. Hey presto we are at the beach. Ok we need to work on the beach sounds. The sound of whale songs and walruses fighting are not that common on the Yorkshire coast – but that’s nit picking. As a safe, social distancing adventure it most certainly worked. Now I just need to rebag the sand for our next trip. Maybe it’s to a desert.