How to spend Christmas Eve. 2nd instalment

(You thought I’d forgotten, didn’t you?)

“Midnight? Midnight?  It’s Christmas Eve for goodness sake.”  It was just as well it wasn’t me on the phone to the AA as it was at this point I suffered a sense of humour blackout.   “There are a lot of people having a far worse Christmas than this” I kept muttering to myself.

“Very sorry sir, but there are some people who’ve already been waiting almost 8 hours.”

We’ve already been waiting 8 hours. You want us to wait another 8?”

I buy more coffee and some peanuts, the only gluten-free food available.  Despite the fact that we’ve been almost the only customers all day, the lady in the cafe still doesn’t acknowledge us.  Meanwhile GPD phones our best hope of rescue, but they’re already in Blackpool for Christmas.  Or Bolton or somewhere starting with a B off the M6.  We knew it was a long shot.

We debate trying to get the car back onto the motorway, to bump ourselves back up the priority list.   Unfortunately, though, we figure that might result in a priority ride to A&E so abandon that plan.

Harthill’s only saving grace is the free WiFi.  Continue reading

The days of Christmas

On the first day of Christmas my 3 boys gave to me…
…a basketful of dirty laundry.

So that would be GP1, GP2 and GPD.

It became a basketful or more after I collected 3 wet towels from one bedroom floor and 4 from another then went into the bathroom and threw a wobbly at the pile of clothes on the floor.  I collected it all, dumped it in the sitting room, and proclaimed that henceforth any clothes I picked off the floor would go into a bin bag and then the bin.  And I wouldn’t be the one replacing them.  It worked for a while…

On the 2nd day of Christmas my 3 boys gave to me…
…two piles of ironing and a basketful of dirty laundry.

Nothing new there, then.

On the 3rd day of Christmas my 3 boys gave to me…
…3am vomiting*, two piles of ironing and a basketful of dirty laundry.

*Poetic license. It was only 1 boy – GP2. Too much chocolate rather than alcohol we think hope.  Murphy’s Law, according to the Guardian, states Continue reading