Val’s Comments (group member since Aug 28, 2019)

Val’s comments from the Beyond Zon group.

Duke - if you see this, you've left one game off your footy tips:

Sydney Swans v Collingwood Magpies (in Sydney)

How frightening for both your Mum and you Duke. I do hope she revives quickly. Isabella's suggestion of water sounds good as well as simple. Perhaps sipping through a straw?

I do hope everyone's feeling as good as they can. I'll say it again - it's no fun getting old. But I'm not up for the alternative quite yet.

Where's Duke? He's been out of touch for about a week now. Hope all is well.

I recently read this article which alerts one to the possible cumulative affect (not good in this case) of taking vitamin supplements. Who thinks to look at what breakfast cereals contain??

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-08-0...

P wrote: "Afternoon all, phoned the docs and got an emergency appointment…what a surprise! Had a good exam and on explaining what i’ve been going through she thinks I have diverticulitis which is an infectio..."

So glad you managed to see a doc. Diverticulitis is no joke. Fingers crossed the antibiotics do the job.

Crikey, I hope you're feeling a bit better now P. Otherwise another trip to the doc might be in order.

And while I'm grumbling, also very annoying to open the front door at 11.00am and find a parcel collection notice there when we've both been home all morning and all they had to do was knock or ring the bell! Especially annoying as pick-up is not from the local post office but at some collection depot necessitating a car trip.

I'm here. A chilly and rainy day in Melbourne. I'm getting quite fed up with Goodreads continually asking me to sign in and telling me I need to update my password. I usually wind up signing in through Amazon.

Mr H's two grand-nieces (13 and 11) have both played football from very young and they both seem to be in quite successful junior teams (in the Greater Manchester area). Recently the younger one was chosen as part of a small group to go to Old Trafford and train with the Reds' women's squad. They had a wonderful day and it was particularly lovely to see her name in the electronic signage that travels around the ground - in big letters : Welcome to Old Trafford [Jane Smith]. That's how to encourage the youngsters to keep going with the game.

No Chrissie pressies in July, Duke. Saved some money there! We had a lovely day yesterday. Food was wonderful, the five little cousins all played happily together and the adults enjoyed catching up. I was home before dark (lots of traffic on the roads!) so was able to put my feet up and watch some of the competition in Birmingham. It's nice to cheer on the underdogs - how good is that cyclist from Trinidad & Tobago??? Not so much an underdog, he is the world champion after all, but still.

Or as 5 year old grandson said : Fake Christmas.

theDuke wrote: "Is this how Australians do Christmas then Val? Have it in the middle of July! Or is there a tradition during your summers as well?..."

Christmas is still December 25 and like many, we still cook turkey and chicken and Christmas pud in up to 40 degree temperatures - crazy! A lot of people do favour cold seafood on the big day - salmon, prawns, crayfish. But "Christmas in July" is also quite a big thing. Our TV is full of ads from the good (expensive) folk at Balsam Hill

https://www.balsamhill.com.au/

and even KFC have embraced it complete with jumpers for you and your dog -

https://christmasinjuly.kfc.com.au/

Here's the KFC blurb (eye-watering delivery cost!):

Starting 12 July 2022, KFC have brought back the Christmas in July Feast!

This year, they’ve also introduced new Christmas Stuffing Mayo & Cranberry Dipping sauces to go along with it.

For $49.95, the Christmas in July Feast comes with:

15 pieces of Original Recipe Chicken
8 Wicked Wings
12 Nuggets
1 Maxi Popcorn Chicken
3 Large Chips
1 Large Potato & Gravy
1.25L Drink
3 Dipping Sauces including new Christmas Stuffing Mayo & Cranberry Dipping sauce

The Christmas in July Feast is available until 8 August 2022. During the Christmas in July promotion, KFC have also introduced Christmas Dipping Box!

During the promotional period, you can get it delivered free through the KFC App – however, through delivery the cost is $52.95.

1 degree tonight! Just as well tomorrow is "Christmas Day".

I don't know Birmingham but it looks fabulous in all the scenes we're seeing from the Commonwealth Games.

It's still cool here - 5 degrees C overnight tonight and 2 degrees tomorrow night! I had a lovely lunch with the Mothers' Club on Tuesday. One of our number has numerous health issues and is very nervous of going out in congested areas. As the weather isn't conducive to outdoor eating, we all went to her house. She has the most beautiful home and garden and is a born homemaker - sews, cooks, gardens all at near professional level. She made us the tastiest vegetarian lasagna I've ever had. J brought cheese, crackers, dips and vege sticks, C brought an amazing salad with sweet potato, pumpkin, tomatoes, lettuce, etc and I made a plum and almond cake with whipped cream and Amaretto syrup. A much better meal than anything we could have paid for.

Yesterday I made it over to Grandparents' Day. Left home at 6.45am in the dark but had no trouble getting a park at the station and the train was near empty. The Preps (Reception?) were celebrating their first 100 days of school and were asked to dress up as an old person - some fabulous get-ups! I loved one little boy in a sharp suit, pork-pie hat, pencil moustache and shaggy eyebrows - he just needed a pair of binoculars and a form guide to look the picture of a racecourse tout. Because it's a Catholic school we had a full mass (very different to my school days when everything was in Latin!) followed by a great spread of scones, fruit cake, etc. I was home by mid-day thankfully. Then last night I had a lovely phone call from a friend in the Wirral - it was her birthday and I had ordered some wine, cheese and chocolates for her through Amazon. They had all been delivered and she was in great form. We've known each other since school days (64 years) although she is two years younger than me but we still have much in common even though it's 40 years since we last met up in the flesh.

Today I made preparations for Saturday when our family will all be getting together for our annual Christmas In July celebration. My older daughter hosts it and we all dress up in our loudest Christmas jumpers and have a slap-up meal. Daughter No. 1 is doing a roast (pork?), carrots, roast potatoes, cauliflower cheese, followed by gingerbread and brownies. My son is on cheese, crackers, cold meats and dips. Daughter No. 2 is providing shortbread and a fresh fruit platter. I'm bringing a mock Christmas cake, Gluhwein and Stone's Green Ginger Wine. I say "mock" because it's made in a round ring using self-raising flour and a jar of mincemeat and only goes in the oven for 40 minutes. I'll ice it tomorrow. That's quite a busy enough week for me!

Here in Melbourne we made it to 17 degrees C today but still overcast and grey. We did manage to keep the heating off until 5.00pm (the last gas bill gave us the horrors!). I've been into the city twice in the last 5 days - on Thursday to see one of my favourite singers, Rob Snarski, doing a free in-store gig at Basement Discs (their business is still battling with so many people still working from home) and on Saturday to see a play (Come Rain or Come Shine), not really a musical although there were some songs by Tim Finn (Split Enz, Crowded House). Tomorrow I'm having lunch with friends (the Mothers' Club - we've been friends since our children were in kindergarten and we're now all grandmothers) and on Wednesday I'll be up at the crack of dawn to make my way over to the other side of town as it's Grandparents' Day at my grandson's school. I have to be there by 9.15am which will mean leaving home by 7.00am at the latest. Just hope it's not raining!

I trust you're all keeping as well as can be expected and that your son, P, is making some headway in his recovery.

EDIT: I should add that I'm masked up everywhere even if at least 50% of people (mostly the young ones) aren't.

Wow, that is really a frightening scenario P. So many people are good and helpful but unfortunately, you can't rely on everyone to do the right thing. I think Isabella is right. You may never know what happened and you have enough things to worry about without adding yet another. I hope you all survive this latest incident.

I've just caught up with the last day's posts and was dismayed to hear of your boy's collapse P. How frightening! I hope he realises now he must monitor himself more closely. Diabetes is a bugger! All us oldies (not so much Duke) have got our aches and pains to deal with but he's got a long life ahead of him.

And I trust you are all able to find some shelter from the heat. Our forecast for tomorrow is a low of 3 degrees and a high of 12. But it is supposed to be sunny! I think I shall be spending a lot of the day behind the north-facing windows. In summer it's cool showers to cool down but this winter it's been hot showers to thaw out!

I'd almost given up on clearing the current cough/cold that has lingered for weeks. Not Covid, thankfully. Anyway today I was feeling brighter so went in to the city (as a kid I grew up saying "we're going into town", but for some reason here in Australia, you go in to the city) to attend a free classical concert on the Melbourne Town Hall organ. Apparently it is four stories high, 150 years old and the most valuable musical instrument in the world (well, that's what the man said!). A very personable young man from Western Australia (some kind of musical wunderkid) played selections from Bach, Handel, Franck, Debussy, Mendelssohn, Holst and accompanied a short film put together by Salvador Dali and Walt Disney (Destino) and it was very entertaining and informative. Sitting in the front row, only a couple of metres from him, it was like watching Fred Astaire dancing while driving a car and playing the piano - I have never seen feet move so quickly over keys!

I've had an email from the rheumatologist! I had a blood test on May 27 to detect CCP antibodies and then I had to email the specialist a week later to report on any side-effects or improvement. His response thanked me for my "nicely worded email" and wants me to double the dose of methotrexate so that will be two tablets every Monday night. Next step will be another blood test on August 2 before I see him again on August 8. Things have improved a lot but there's still many simple things I can't do - like combing the back of my hair or putting a jumper on/off over my head. Bugger getting old! I hope everyone else here is feeling good about their own health concerns as well as those of their families.