Bristol Busyness (post of the day 2)

See, I'm making up for lost time, in (hopefully) easily digestable chunks.

Return to my beloved Bristol.  I just love this city, but my low mood of late has made me resent my living arrangements just a tad.  I'm fine living alone, most of the time.  I actually quite like it at times.  No one to compromise around.  Just me!  (how selfish!!)  But being blue as of late, I've found myself feeling particularly lonely and noticably missing having someone there to help me through with hugs, and chats and face to face support.  But Derby helped.  So I came back relatively refreshed.  Glad to be back in my own little space.

Not glad to be facing the prospect of my audit report with a pounding headache.  So my addiction got the better of me

Working on a birthday cardigan for Rowan instead.  For a little while at least.  Felt really awful with the headache so mainly vegged in front of the telly.  Why do headache strike at such unhelpful times?

So the audit was left for Thursday, and somehow, not sure how exactly, I managed to come up with over 3800 reasonable coherent words, over 3300 of which came on Thursday.  I'm not sure if it was my best work ever, but all things considered, I'm just glad to get it out the way.  It was such an uphill struggle to get myself motivated and working.  Just ask Sarah who was gently nudging me on via Ravelry mail, eventually resorting to threatening to hide my new shiney beautiful undyed yarn that we've been stock piling for a bumper Easter dyeing session.  Thanks for your support and encouragement Sarah :)

Had some lectures on Friday afternoon.  And registering with the GMC (General Medical Council), which is the first step in getting that shiney piece of paper called a doctor's licence.  I would be more excited, but the afore mentioned touch of residual blues and the fact that I've done it all before kind of make it unexciting for me.  Last year, it was an exhilaratingly scary event.  This year, it was just filling out a form.  Boring!

And then I was supposed to meet up with Charlotte and Farah, my Cheltenham flatmates, for coffee.  But Charlotte's computer was giving her hassle, so it was just me and Farah.  It was gone five, and we looked at each other and decided we weren't in the mood for coffee, how about a drink!  Lol!  Oh dear!  Coffee turned into (between the two of us) a bottle of wine, two cocktails and a glass of champagne. It was so much fun.  Usually have to really be in the mood to go out drinking like this.  And apparently I was in the mood.  I had sooooooooooooooo much fun, giggling chatting laughing and to be honest, feeling rather drunk, never mind tipsy!  I get tipsy far more often that I get properly drunk.  I love this feeling!  (Sometimes.  I generally don't like NOT being in control, and it's a fine line that can be inadvertantly crossed).  I think that it was just what I needed after the calm of Derby which worked wonders, this worked wonders in a different way, almost like filling in the gaps.  And also a good unwinder after the stress of the rushed audit.  Laughing so hard, and talking about the dreams and hopes of the future as working doctors.  We even decided to go on for dinner, needed something to counter the liquid diet!  A very tasty trip to Wagamama's, once of my fave restaurants.  And then since Farah had other plans (remember, it was meant to only be a coffee at five, and it was nearly nine!) we parted ways and I went home for a night in front of the telly.

Saturday, girly shopping with Mary in town.  Treated myself to some new Benefit eye make up (we sat at the House of Fraser counter and got make overs).  It's very sutle and comes with it's own brushes and some concealer, which is great.  I've really been noticing dark circles in the last few months.  Dare I say it, I think it may be a sign of old age!!  And then Mary came back to mine for some G&Ts and tasty takeaway from my fave ever Indian.  We spent ages searching the Ravelry patterns and have found a pattern for a sweater for Mary.  She's been looking around in shops, but not found anything.  So now very excited to be combining our efforts for a one of a kind.  We're going yarn shopping at Get Knitted next weekend.  So pumped.  It will be my first adult sized garment (beyond hats and scarfs) so I'm a little apprehensive about getting bored and it taking ages.  But Mary's tiny, so it's just like a big kid size, and it's chunky (one of my requirements! so it knits up faster).  It will be my next big project after Rowan's birthday cardigan, which is a very boring garter stitch but an utterly fascinating construction.  The fronts and sleeves are knitting in one piece, then joined on a circular needle (normal straight needle would never be long enough) to knit the back half of the sleeves and the back in on long row.  It's currently looking like this:

It looks so bizarre, and the rows are taking forever to knit, especially as the sleeves are extra long, so that they can have a folded up suff.  You can kind of get an idea of the finished item when it's folded into shape a bit more:

And Sunday - lazy day in, knitting, and relaxing after all the busy chaos.  And that's all I'm going to bore you lot with for now.  Love to you all, especially those who've made my life more barable in recent weeks.  And well done if you've managed to get the end of this post as well as the other one from today!  I'm sorry, waffling stuff! 

Derby Healing (Post of the day 1)

Okay, so here's the deal.  I've just checked when I last posted and it was well over a week ago.  Man, it started so well.  And for a change, it isn't actually because I've lacked things to talk about.  I agree, it's partly because I've been feeling so out of it and in a... erm, how shall I put it?  A funny mood?  But I'm determined to get myself out of it, and I know that being in Derby has gone a long way to get me started on that front.  So... anyways, the afore mentioned deal is that I'm going to attempt to put up two posts today.  The first all about Derby, and the second a quick catch up about what else has been going on.  That is, if I can remember all of Derby coherently!  It's been a while!

Thursday: a little bit of a lie in (whatelse is new!?) and then after rattling round the empty house, I decided to gate crash Sarah's.  And I walked!  (surprisingly on 32mins door to door, why did I never think to do it before?).  Just the quiet, loud, peace chaos of having little people running around.  Even if they are sleepy and are thus just perfect for long snuggly cuddles when Mummy needs the loo!:

(hehe, sorry for stealing the photo Sarah, but it's cute!!)
And then there was good food, crafting talk and doing, catching up.  And just being.  Sarah is very good at letting me do this.  Just being.  It's hard to describe.  It's nothing "special" in particular but it's perfection in stillness and unwinding (just spent ages searching for the right word, and I'm still not happy, but that will have to do!).  I don't feel the pressure to be anything but myself.  Which sounds like a stupid statement.  Do I really go through life not being myself?  No, not really.  But I'm usually a label, myself, but a particular version of it.  A medical student.  A nursing assistant.  Enthusiastic about going out.  Alone but not minding.  Crowded but not minding.  Running around.  But in these quiet moments (well, it's quiet in a different way, I mean, come on, how quiet can you be with three littles running around!?) I'm none of those labels.  And it's so good for me to stop, and be unlabelled!  And I always feel calmer and safe and more at peace from my life's stress after these times.  I'm not forced to be something, and always being something is draining.  I need a break, but I don't always realise it. 

And before I realised it, it was late.  Where had the time gone?!  And a very kind Martin drove me home.  But not before I had started to make plans for a very busy Friday.

Friday:  Met Emma and Connor at 1pm for some lunch and a wonder around some shops.  A lovely catch up and time to spend with two very dear and special people to me.  Even if the poor loves were both feeling under the weather following a nasty cold.  I can't believe how much Connor has grown.  And he's so lovely, so smilely and ready to give me his very biggest grin!  Aww, how can I resist such charm! 

Then we met up with a solo Sarah, whilst Martin took the girls to a dad's group.  Girlie day out!  Going wool shopping and wool-lusting.  Picking out colours for new projects, and in my case picking up wool for the sake of it.... well, because it was on special, and they were both yarns I have been wanting to try out... now what to do with them!?  And going to tea and cake.  Can't remember the last time we did this.  Just the three (and a bit) of us. 

And then time to tag team out friends, and meet more!  Lol!   My hot sexy SamSam (hehehe! ;) hehe!)  and Simon.  Dinner at Nandos, with sangria, then back to Sam's for more sangria, Trivial Pursuit, Scrabble and Buzz.  Lots of giggles and chatting and catching up with Sam.  Trying to get me tipsy!  lol!  Until Kev came home and again it was a case of a day that flew by.  And again, a lovely beautiful day of contrasts and such a wonderful reminder of why I'm so lucky.  I have such amazing friends, who all bring out something different in me, and know so well how to keep me entertained and to cheer me up about all the recent events.

Saturday:  I had originally planned to go to dinner at Sarah's again, and have a little bit of a games night.  But I was getting the distinct impression that my parents were getting miffed about me coming home and STILL not seeing them!  So, I cancelled dinner and did the dutiful thing of staying in and relaxing with them.  Laughing with my mum in the kitchen as we washed up and got things ready for a birthday meal for my aunt.  Awww... I will miss them not being around when I go back to Derby for Easter.  It will be so strange being in their house without them.  But I'm sure I'll cope.

Sunday:  Family day of note!  Grandparents, aunt, cousin, parents.  Tasty roast.  I never get round to doing roasts for just me.  I ate so much that I never got round to having pudding, even though mums made a very tasty (looking) pavlova and a sticky toffee pudding.  I got my laptop out and showed Gran and Hayley all my knitting and displayed all my crazy new knowledge about knitting techniques, yarn characteristics and dyeing.  I think I may have lost them.  I did get to show off my newly completed scarf for Farah.  It looks so pretty and in sunlight looks much more muted than I was expecting.  I'm dead proud on my first lace knitting attempt.  I still need to block it so that the pattern shows off properly.  But it looks a little like this:

Monday:  Story time at the library with Sarah and Emma and their respective babes.  Hehe.  Playing games like "where's Morgan?  Have you seen Morgan, Daddy?  I wonder where she's got to..." and running around with Jenna.  I love so much spending time with these kids.  I think it has a lot to do with the kid philosophy of living for the moment and making life's purpose about the pursuit of fun.  And what's wrong with that?  More tea drinking and then back to Sarahs.  On the bus for me, with a angelically behaved Jenna who asked to come along.  Only a few dodgy looks when she started talking about how everyone would be thinking "That woman came into town alone, but now, what's going on?  She's got a kid with her!"  Ermm... shhhhhhhhh Jenna!  People frown upon things like that!  I honestly haven't stolen you and your parents know where you are!  And you know where you are!  Don't make the good citizens of Derby want to lynch me!

Tuesday:  Mumsie's day off.  So quality Mumsie time.  Chilling out at home watching rubbish tv movies and nipping into town and browsing round M&S.  Such a mummy thing to do!  lol!  Only spoilt by the gaggle of chav school girls who insisted that my mother had knocked a little toddler that was with them (don't know why they had a kid with them, I'm sure most of them were in uniform).  Thing was my mum hadn't even moved her chair!  And they were really quite agressive about it.  And my mum's not really the sort who handles herself well in these situations.  They really bullied her.  Annoying bunch of little such and suchs, really upset her.

Wednesday:  Special day.  I got to see my Godmother, who I've not seen in like a decade.  It was lovely to see her.  And to feel her love and her positive effect on my parents.  She's a cousin (of some sort!) of my dad and when my parents were newly wed with little kids, and my mom's parents lived in England, she was a proxy mum for my mum.  She has a very special place in our hearts.  How lovely to still be in touch with her and for her to visit. 

And then it was time to go back to Bristol.  Already put off by a day so I could see Auntie Vonnie. 

As you may have noted, I've not mentioned my audit report.  It was really pushed to the back of my mind and instead was left as a joy for Bristol. 

Derby did exactly what I wanted and needed it to do.  It healed me.  It destressed me.  After the month I had had, I needed the love and support of my friends and family close to me.  I wasn't coping very well by myself.  I was feeling so low, and on the verge of tears that never came. And so I went back to Bristol with a lighter heart and more at peace with the crash and all it's stress.  Some good will come of it (and I think it may already have) and I needed some time, support and perspective.  And I've had that now.  I feel more relaxed about it.  I still feel very sad about it all, and obviously I wish it had never happened.  But I'm finally okay with it having happened.  I'm still not back to my normal bouncy self.  I still feel a little depressed and amotivated but it's improving.  And that's what I've got to focus on.

Escape to Derby

Now that's a phrase I never really thought I'd say!  But here I am, so relieved to be back in Derby, surrounded by my loved ones.  My cheque came today and has been duely deposited and then as fast as I could, I got my flat in order and packed up to come to Derby.  Part of me wants to say home, but I really do view Bristol as home.  My flat, my space, my rules, my life.  But at the same time... Derby does have it's charms I suppose.  And if we go by the old saying "home is where your heart is", I've very torn.  Bristol usually wins, hands down.  But as of late, with recent events, and probably the events of the last near year, Derby has edged back in.  It was where I came to heal over the summer last year, and it's where I find myself again, in need of more healing.

My mom had decided that I wasn't likely to be back today, so there was a mad rush to feed me this evening, having only got food ready for themselves.  But they were insistant that I would be eating in with them, despite Sarah's very kind and generous offer to feed me.

And there's only one slight problem.  I was supposed to have got the majority of my audit write up done before I came to Derby (plan for months, even before recent uphevels) but I've been a bit of a lazy, moppy such-and-such and haven't really made much progress on that.  Then comes the hiccup.  I've left my work in Bristol - well the data that I had collected over the last couple of weeks.  I've got my laptop (obviously) and all the background stuff I have researched, plus access to internet for anything else that I need to lookup.  It's just hard to write up results and conclusions when you don't have the data.  So I'm going to have to see how organised I can be and get as much of it as humanly possible done, so that when I get back to Bristol, I just need to spend a couple of hours on it.  I know vaguely what the data showed, so I suppose that I can just leave a bunch of blanks for specific values and fill them in later.  A bit of a hassle, but oooooh well...!

And now, off to bed.  I can't wait to get cracking tomorrow on seeing people, even though my lack of car will make it a little tricky!  I will have to familiarise myself with bus routes to friends and also do a lot more walking... mmm, but thought, didn't bring proper walking shoes... just my boots (ok, but heeled, so will hurt sooner or later) and my brown shoes, which will just have to do the job!  Ahhhh, what adventures await!

Catching up... again

It's been ages.  And quite a tough stressful ages.  The car issue has been dragged out and I've been back in Bristol, dealing with the stress of sorting it all out and dealing with it all alone.  I know that this is a decision that I have made for myself, and I honestly don't mind, but I don't think I've ever felt it as much as I have over the last couple of weeks.  I have been in touch with my friends and family loads, but knocking around my flat by myself, time has dragged, and the loneliness dreadful.  I've felt so restless at times and so trapped at others.  I've wanted to scream and then cry.  You'll be glad to know that I haven't!  But I've felt like it!

But in amongst it all there have been positive moments, with the support of my wonderful friends.  So here it is, the story of the last few weeks.

The car:  I ended up accompanying the car, on a flat bed truck, to the insurance appointed garage, which was beyond Bristol.  Fortunately, the very lovely recovery truck driver gave me a lift back to Gloucester, from where I was able to jump on a bus and get back to Cheltenham, at the end of a very long day.  The burnt smell of the airbags lingering on me, all I wanted to do was shower and wash my hair.  And then just curl up in a ball and sleep.  I resisted the urge though, and instead went out for dinner with my coursemates, to celebrate the end of our time in Cheltenham.  I think getting out and about was good for me, to be surrounded by people and to have some distraction.

Thursday, I did allow myself to wallow.  I was suddenly hurt.  I'm not sure if it was a seatbelt injury, or if it was from holding myself tensely and shivering and shaking so much the previous day.  But I was so very sore across my chest.  And exhausted, I had barely slept.  So I stayed at home, did a little knitting, watched some stuff on my laptop and then ended up sleeping all afternoon.  Then we went out to dinner as a flat, a final bonding experience for the three of us, who had individually gone through so much in that flat, that we had shared and supported each other through.  I'm so glad to have bonded such lovely girls who I'm sure we will always look back at our time fondly and be grateful for.

Friday brought new adventures - driving again.  I had a courtesy car from my insurance company.  And I was dreading driving.  First time after my crash and also because I've hardly driven any other car since I learnt to drive.  Pleased to say, in a slightly strange, lacking kind of way, it was fine.  It was just driving.  Once I was in the car, it was almost as if nothing had happened.  One of my friends agreed to come back to Bristol with me, to act as some morale support and as a very soothing, calming influence.  And she was wonderful.  Thanks Charlotte.

And life goes on... it was back to work at the weekend.  And then the nightmare of sorting it all out.  Last week Tuesday was an overwhelming day.
1)  I learnt that the driver of the other car is making a personal claim, via a very snooty, aggressive, intimidating letter.  (Which luckily, I have legal cover with the insurance, so all I had to do was forward the letter onto the insurance company and let them deal with it all, so glad about that).  I was very upset and thrown by this letter, but I have been reassured by everyone that it's just par for the course following an accident these days.
2)  I found out about my jobs.  I will be spending the first two years if my working life in Yeovil, a place I've never been to before.  I will be doing the following rotations: F1 - endocrinology; gastric surgery; general medicine.  F2 - GP (mmmm, not something I really wanted); trauma & orthopaedics (something I wanted even less!) and finally Obstetrics and gynaecology (yay, at least I got this!).  I'm sure these two years will be full of all sorts of adventures and learning experiences
3)  The engineer from my insurance company phoned to confirm that the car is a definite write off and to let me know how much I will be receiving.

In amongst this all - the slightly more positives.
My birthday - was on a Sunday.  Was lovely and lazy, full of loving messages, and a evening meal at a pan-Asian buffet in town with some of my friends.
Uni - am currently spending four weeks doing a GP audit.  I have collected my data and then trying to get motivated enough to start writing up the results!
Knitting - Ru wristwarmers are finished.  And so are two gorgeous vests for two lovely little girls.  And now I'm busy working on a lacey scarf for Farrah, using one of the balls of hand dyed that I painted at the workshop.
Friends - random pancake evenings, random relaxing at home, watching 24, playing on the Wii, and general distractions
Visits - the Clarks came and spent an evening with me last weekend.  I crazy, busy, joyous afternoon and evening.  My little flat hasn't had that much noise in weeks combined.  It was great, and just what I needed.  Company.  We didn't do very much, we went shopping (much to the girl's horror, and only redeemed by going to the best toy shop ever!), and a lazy dinner of naan bread pizzas, and all things yarn!  It was lovely, thanks guys, and we have to do it again!

And I think that is a fairly brief summary of things.  I'm still waiting for the cheque to come through, the insurance company have had some silly delays caused by people going on holiday without filing reports.  I'm hoping to get it in the next couple of days.  And then I'm hoping to go home to Derby for a long weekend, to see my parents before they go off on holiday over Easter and to have some company to cheer me up.  I need the soothing, cathartic influence of being around those I love.

And now, some photos:
Firstly, the yarn all dried and looking so amazing, I'm so proud of my creativity and can't wait to see what it all turns out like when knitted.

Sock yarn - pink with purple lowlights

Sock yarn - much brighter green than originally intended

Final sock yarn

Silk hankie

DK for Sarah, was supposed to be turquoise and purple, but ended up blue and purple

DK in gold and earthy red tones

Scrumptious Lace (45% silk, 55% merino) in semisolid plummy colour

Scrumptious Chunky in various shades of blue, purple and red

Ru's wristwarmer's - it's very difficult to take a photo of both your hands when you're by yourself!

Playing with my new toy, a wool winder

Getting ready to start Farrah's scarf

Little vests:

Close up of Jenna's armholes, unintended two tone as I was sooooo close to running out of wool

And they fit!

And finally, my flat being filled with people

The girls helped me wind the left over wool from Morgi's vest and made just-for-her wool of Sarah's.  And not the DVDs aren't all neatly lined up.  Apparently best game in my flat for little bean hands is to pull them all off the shelves until you're sitting in a pile bigger than you!

Apparently wool-winders are great toys for all ages, not just for me!

Just looking through these photos and it amazes me just how busy and full the last few weeks have been, filled with so much bad and yet so much good.  No wonder I feel drained and not myself.  Such a rollercoaster.  But I suppose that's just life...