When our children were little they had various verbal idiosyncrasies and sayings just as, I suspect from my experience, most children and many adults do. I knew a person who could not say 'anonymous' so in committee meetings he would always have to use 'nem con' which sounded a little pretentious even 40 years ago. One of our children called 'lily pads' 'lally pids'. We also pick up sayings from our parents and relatives and some of us are lucky enough to hand down to our children oral snippets we got from our grandparents. CJ and I were brought up in a household where the worst expletive we were likely to hear was the occasional 'dam'. It was considered terribly risqué, therefore, when our Victorian ram-rod straight backed maternal grandmother taught us children the little ditty "I chased a bug around a tree. I'll have his blood; he knows I will."
I could go on but I'll spare you that.
Another of the phrases which seemed to be used a great deal with our children was 'all gone' and I wouldn't mind betting it was/is used in the majority of households.
So yesterday I woke up and realised 'all gone'. The house was quiet. Viv and Elodie's short and very enjoyable visit had come to an end. No more visitors are planned (which doesn't mean no one else will come, of course). In theory I need never go near a grocery shop again before I leave for NZ; I just have to empty the fridge and freezer. I've had help for the last two nights (Carol popped down on Saturday and we ate enough different cheeses to sink a battleship and Pat and Dave helped me eat leftovers last night and we then watched the 'Strictly' results) and I hope I'll have some more help before I go. I enjoy having friends in for dinner.
In the meantime the socks have gone. They've been here since friends of Viv's came up and visited the house a couple of Christmases ago. So they went with Viv and Elodie.
However the book is still here because the original owner who left it bought a replacement. So if anyone wants a book on beekeeping it can be collected any time in the next ten days because I have just ten more sleeps before I step on a plane for Glasgow on the first leg of my migratory journey south.
Well, if you are in town this week, would be nice to buy you a coffee before you go....
ReplyDeleteName the day Andrea. I'm in most days.
DeleteTuesday. Bridge Centre cafe 11am !
ReplyDeleteThat'll be interesting. I've never been there. Se you then.
DeleteAnd if not, the Oxfam shop always likes books on things like beekeeping, stops their shelves filling up with the likes of Jackie Collins!
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately Jenny on the Island it's a bit wet and windy for beekeeping so the book's likely to have a limited readership here. There's no Oxfam Shop either (though we have plenty of other charity shops). It will probably go south with me next year and go to a charity shop in beekeepingland.
DeleteI use "all gone" quite a lot, especially when I'm sharing a snack with Brownie and it's all gone.
ReplyDeleteGlad to hear that the socks are making their way back home.
Wish I had the time for beekeeping, but I'm quite wary of them because of previous lifetime experiences. Not only that, there is a huge beehive in a tree behind my property, and maybe about once a year those bees do swarm, and the sky turns black...they are everywhere....quite scary. Thus I do not need to make the acquaintance of any more bees.
Wow, less than two weeks before you take off...where on earth did the time go?
I used to be in the beekeeping society at school Virginia and I love bees although I'm not sure I'd want to live next a swarming hive. Ours had a habit of swarming high in the trees which made them a devil to get down.
DeleteTime really does fly by. I hope you'll enjoy the last days there to the fullest. But as I said, time flies by. You'll be back again soon enough! :D
ReplyDeleteMersad
Mersad Donko Photography
It does fly Mersad and when you get to my age one wishes that it would slow down!
DeleteIt's odd, but I kind of miss you when you go back to NZ, although you're just as close in cyber terms. Perhaps it's just the fact that you've left the wonderful British winter behind.
ReplyDeleteGood luck with the packing/clearing. I don't envy you that!
Aw shucks Frances. As you say I'll still be cyber close. Yes I miss the hunkering down with a good book on the long winter nights. Sigh. Oh but then I've just remembered the hot, sunny NZ summers and I don't feel so bad. Sorting out the house is more of a problem than the packing. My case usually only weighs about 15k because I have most of my needs over in NZ as well as here. This time I have a 'do' in Glasgow though and that'll necessitate more formal clothes (which I'll leave in Glasgow).
DeleteYears ago I made a list for my husband and myself to check off items when we were going to travel and again check when returning home. I've traveled only once since he died. But you would need a much longer list than mine, I'm sure seeing that your stays are 1/2 a year. Best wishes for your packing, traveling and safe arrival in NZ!
ReplyDeleteNorma I used to make (and still have) very extensive lists of things I needed depending on where I was going. Ironically when I travel to NZ I need very little. Most of the things we take tend to be clothes and other necessities. I have all those in NZ and here in Eagleton so don't carry much between places. Most of it seems to be odds and ends like computer and camera equipment.
DeleteVery droll - especially the original "all gone" post (which I had forgotten but remembered when I saw it again)... So, not long now before you will be "all gone" yourself, again! Even if here in Blogland it just means having to click on a different blog :)
ReplyDeleteYes Monica that's one of the beauties of Blogland. One can live in it without even revealing where one is if one so desires.
DeleteSteve used to say "all gone!" to our cat when he fed her bits of ham at breakfast on weekends and it was gone (or he wanted the rest to himself), so your post evokes quite a nice, nostalgic memory for me.
ReplyDeleteMe too - very nostalgic, given it was probably the first words I ever understood. My mother used to say it when I'd finished food. A sing-song, up-down phrase.
DeleteI didn't know/remember you'd bee-kept Geeb. I need to pick your brains when I've finished the Godwit series, because the honey bee is my next topic, I think. I began it during my postgrad dip, and want to explore it further.
I'm glad that the memories were nice ones for you Meike.
DeleteI too, as did my Mum, use an up-down sing-song voice for the phrase. I think, Katherine, that is what come naturally. I've just been sitting here trying to do it the other way around: I can't. As for bee-keeping that was at school where we had an extensive apiary but it was over 50 years ago!