Is anyone still there?

Oy. 

It has been some time. It has also been an immensely frustrating time when your email account is hacked and hello, I am not in Manila and I do not need money. 

A) Manila is not even on page 90,836,734,548,920,202 of the bucket list.

B) I would NEVER ask for money! 

C) I would have told you if I was off on an adventure, which clearly I did not. 

D) You all know I do not speak in the kind of way that email was written. 

E) I sign my name Linds, if I sign it at all. Not LINDSAY in capitals.

 It is all sorted, but not before you were all sent an email if your address was in my contact list. I do apologise and a pox on all evil hackers/spammers. The ultimate irony is that the spam email was one from my email provider. However, I see that this is so common that they have now ditched yahoo as a provider and are going  it alone. I have no idea why they ever changed. AND the Evil One also redirected my mail for all of 12 hours that it took to get it all sorted and hunky dory again. Indian call centres redeemed themselves.

Sigh.

Sorry, people. All is up and running and tickety boo again.

So the days have vanished, and I have not sat down at this computer for ages. It feels weird. The fingers are clumsy and still lock, but here I am. Missy arrived for a short visit, and Moregranny had a wonderful time with her out in the park, the library and garden. And Doing Craft. We made a bird house out of a cardboard box and MUCH embellishment. And a roll of sticky tape. She had a wonderful time.

So did Moregranny.

So what has been happening............. there is a new Prince in the land, Prince George has arrived, and the heat...... dear Heaven. The heat. We have hit the 30s, which I know is not very high, but the humidity means that even mid 20s, there is no air, and one drips. So I have taken to dampening a tea towel and popping it in the freezer and then either wrapping it over my head, which seems to have mislaid any skills at temperature regulation, or around my neck. Or over the legs. Anywhere. It works.  Hmmm. I must pop a few more in the freezer, I think. Lots more.

Actually, I think it is pay back for sailing through the menopause without a single symptom or hot flush. We are making up for it now. My hair permanently frizzes, and I am long past worrying about it. Thankfully, I can now twist it up on top of the head and get it out the way. 

We will not be making any front pages of glamour magazines in the near future.

The garden is growing. The beans are growing. Down at the allotment, the courgettes, pumpkins, gem squash and cucumber are threatening to overtake the world. I may have planted them a little too close together. And maybe 3 in a bed would have been more than enough. 9 is proving to be slightly problematic, as in I can't get close to the beds any more. I sort of sling the water in the general direction of the greenery and call it good.

But one soldiers on valiantly.

We have been eating lettuce, potatoes, spinach, beans, courgettes and broad beans from the garden - I love popping out into the garden to pick food for supper. There are hundreds of tomatoes growing bigger by the day, although they will take some time to ripen, of course.

My daughter will attest to the fact that I am battling on the energy field. I fall asleep the moment I sit down anywhere, and then can't sleep a wink at night. The heat, as I may have already mentioned. It is as if I had the central eating on full blast. So conversation is somewhat lacking in the evenings.

Last Sunday, we had Glynis and Peter and their family here for a BBQ, which was wonderful. So much fun. Even more fun to know one could plan a BBQ because that sun stayed up there in the sky for weeks. There has been church, looking after dogs for G and P while they were away for a week, watering of their garden, Jean's garden, the allotment and home, of course - all at different and yet similar times.

My life consists of water, and gardens, and moaning when the torrential rain did finally come (it filled the water butts! Hooray!) and flattened said garden too. Stuff broke. You would have thought it was a national disaster, had you seem me last week. I mean is was FLAT. So was I. But, with the aid of sticks and much propping up and cutting back, it has survived. Sort of.

My daisy squares..... did I mention them? They have not multiplied. Books have not been read. (Well, it took me a month to read America the Beautiful, by Ben Carson. Very interesting.) My grand idea to read 52 in my 60th year is going to be a challenge. We are already 2 months in. One book is not a stellar beginning. Maybe I will add in the ones I read to Missy. That will tick a few boxes. They are books, of course. Very short books about fairies and princesses. She is such a girly girl!

So it is summer in England. Diana has been doing some temping, and had to use my car for a couple of weeks, so I stayed close to home. Apart for the aquazumba, some pilates, and aquarobics. Thank heavens I have good friends who go too! But I have LOVED being at home. Pottering. Dozing in the rocking chair. Tending my garden. Freezing the mountain of courgettes. Planting. Deadheading. It takes me all afternoon to water the small garden here, you know. I chase the shade around, so I can do it slowly and rest in between. The days of bounding all over the place are long gone.

Eau de Mosquito Repellent has taken over as perfume of the moment here too. Pesky things - I asked the question on Facebook last week - what was the Good Lord thinking when he invented bindweed - a horrible weed which climbs up every living plant and strangles it - and then I added mosquitoes to the same category. Stick around, and I am sure I will find more things to add to that list. I will be handing it over when I reach the pearly gates, for Answers. I seem to be allergic to mosquito bites. Spider bites, any insect bite. So, add great red swellings to the frazzled hair. Oh, and I haven't worn make-up for weeks. It melts off as soon as it goes on.

I am sure you are getting the picture by now.

Visiting our friend, Tessa, and wandering around her glorious garden. Mine is about the size of her pond. Stunning. 

Anyway. Moving has been a challenge, but we are on the case. Concentrating has been a challenge, so I decided to adjust the medication I take in an effort to raise the IQ a little. It is consumed by one of the tablets, and there is only so long I can manage before I need it back. There is, of course, a price to pay, but it is like wearing a skirt or a dress - the choice is whether to try to keep cool and have liquid fire dancing around your legs or expiring from the heat. So we wear skirts and dresses and don't take one of the meds, and we choose the consequences and hopefully we will be in touch with the IQ soon.

You know how some meds dry out the system? Well. One can survive anything, but when the sinuses dry out, enough is enough, and the list of meds to counteract the side effects grows, you get to the stage where you draw a line and won't cross it. So that is where I am. Trying a new balancing act.

But I hate talking about me.

Apart from my garden and my thoughts and my exciting life. And my dreams. My days.

We all have challenges. But challenges are there to be met. To stretch us. Refine us. Change our lives in ways we cannot imagine. Thank God for faith. And it could always be worse.

Schools are finally on holiday here, as of Tuesday this week,. and there is the sound of children playing out in the gardens and a slower pace of village life. A summer pace. Evenings sitting out in the gardens, BBQs. Fruit salad - I made a bowl this morning after I froze more beans. If stuff doesn't get done early, the heat means it never gets done, so early it is then.

This afternoon, I am popping down to the library. I have been showing an older lady how to work her iPad on Friday afternoons. She is having a Facebook lesson today, because she can only read hers and doesn't know how to post. So that will be fun. Provided that the library has a couple of fans. The last time Missy and I were there, I was a puddle. The librarian became quite concerned by the beetroot appearance and offered water to cool me down. I just do not cope with that kind of heat. Actually, everyone knows I am from darkest Africa, so they assume I am used to it. Hah. Where I came from, there was no humidity,. Shade meant cooler. Sea breezes. This is something else.

But it is sunny and hot and I am loving the doors and windows wide open. Now that I have frozen tea towels I can cope with anything.

I have a school friend from Australia coming to visit me on Monday afternoon - we last saw each other when we were about 15, I think. We have quite a few years to catch up on!

So I am back. Now I need to know what everyone else has been up to as well. I have some serious reading to do. Maybe if I list everyone's blogs as books, that will count towards my 52 books.................