A very varied day!

We were both tired after such a long but lovely day yesterday so it was a slow start. I saw to the roses while Mr C sorted the van out then I had to dash off.

Firstly I wanted to see Val M who is in Alnwick hospital. She has MS and suddenly last week had terrible trouble with her back. Scans say she had breaks but she hadn’t had a fall so now the verdict is osteoporosis. She has to be in the hospital (where #1 daughter was) till they can find a means of getting her from bed to wheelchair etc. - while I was there they came to try out a contraption which unfortunately was not suitable. Now they are going to have to go to her house to assess it for a hoist and whether she’ll be able to go home. It’s so awful as there’s a shortage of carers and 2 people will be needed to move her. Her husband is so stressed and her daughter lives in Denmark. We were introduced to two new nurses as “our international nurses”.

I was very late in picking up Lynn to take her for our planned garden visit but I judged it was more important to keep Val company as understandably she’s very down which is so unlike her.

Lynn and I had a quick walk in the rain, admiring the roses and she told me about the play she’s directing that’s going to be on next week around some Northumbrian villages. She’s really tired and stressed too and the assistant director broke her hip and the lighting chap is new. It’ll be all right on the night!

She said her sister is annoyed as a film company has turned up in her village, Craster, and the road is closed off so it is taking locals 5 minutes extra to get in and out. Turns out this is where Nathaniel is - I thought it was Morpeth but that was a drop-off point.

I had a rush to get back in time to get down to meet Katy for a lift to an event she invited me to at Brinkburn. It look me back to to 70s - “A Holistic sound bath offers you an opportunity to release stress and tension while instilling feelings of joy, peace, and love through the sacred sounds of the grounding Drum, harmonic Himalayan Singing Bowls and ancient, ambient Gongs.” I would rather have watched the woman use all these instruments instead of lying on a hard floor in a tipi for an hour trying to find my inner joy and peace. I kept thinking of Edina in AbFab.