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...

The week that was

It's now been about a week since I last posted, and how much can happen in a week, so of which has needed a bit of time for me to be able to talk about easily (ish).

The week started lovely with another trip to Cirencester to meet up with Lorri for dinner.  We went to a wonderful Indian restuarant, and had a lovely time.  And Lorri treated me as an early birthday pressie, since we aren't sure if she's likely to see me nearer the time.

Tuesday was a quiet night in, when I finally got round to finishing Ru's wristwarmers, (well, I say finish, I haven't quite got round to sewing in the tails).  It was a huge relief, really happy with the way they look, but am very glad to be moving onto something new, and more colourful.  Which I did, I started my latest project, a little vest for Morgan.

Then Wednesday came...  My heart starts beating faster everytime I even think about what happened on that day.  How much it changed everything.  All the negative emotions that well up in me.  I was going on a hospice visit, out in the back of beyond, and on a windy, confusing, unfamiliar country lane, I crashed my car.  I did not realise that the road wasn't a straight  road, but was actually a t-junction until too late.  I slammed on the brakes, and for the briefest time, I thought to myself, it's going to be close, I'm going to stop, I'll be shaken, but everything will be okay.  But then... I don't think I even realised until I was sitting in my car, smoke filling the air and the airbag deflating in front of me, that I couldn't avoid it.  The road was wet and slippery, and it was a slight downhill.  I had crashed into another car.  Everyone is mostly okay.  The other lady seemed to have a seatbelt injury,  and my passenger hurt her ankle somehow.  And me, I have a small graze on my knee, and a bruise from the seatbelt (I assume) and have for the last few days, some muscular pain across my chest.  My beloved Ernie is much worse for wear, and everyone who has seen him said they thought he'd be a write off, but I'm still waiting to hear from the insurance company with regards to this.   Everyone has been calm, patient and effecient.  All the emergancy services that attended the scene were fantastic and helpful.  I was so shocked and just a tad hysterical and mostly useless, so I am very grateful indeed for all the help I recieved.  And I'm very grateful for all my fantastic friends, both near and far who have been supportive and been there for me, reassuring, caring and wonderful.  There's just so much I could say about the day, and go into so much more detail, but it's hard, and I don't really have the energy to deal with it, and I don't think I particularly need to.  So that's all I'm going to say about the incident.

And for now, that's all I'm going to say about the week.  There's so much more that's happened since, so I'll tackle that tomorrow :)

Go Ernie, Go Ernie!

Great news one and all!  I have survived the day, sanity intact!  And for the first time Ernie passed his MOT with flying colours, not even an advisory note in sight!  I am relieved beyond words to not be forking out yet another small fortune to sort out yet another list of things found wrong at the MOT.  Well, I say forking out, more like abusing the credit card and spend the next few months reliving the whole affair when the credit card statement arrived.  And I suppose I should also remind myself that whilst I didn't have to pay anything at the time of the MOT, I did get the new back tyres a couple of days ago.  Now if we can just survive until I start work, then this money thing will be less of an issue.  Roll on August!

My day mainly entailed catching buses in the freezing rain.  It was so cold this morning, after I had dropped Ernie off at the car doctors', I went to see Sam, and this meant getting into town.  My cheeks were stinging with the icy rain falling on them, it was horrible.  But I was very lucky that Sam was able to warm me up, good and toasty, with a lovely cuppa, food (steaming hot potato wedges - Sam makes the best potato wedges, she certainly has the knack! and choc cupcakes with lilac icing) and entertainment (in the form of Myst IV).  Poor lass had to put up with my streaming nose, which the cold damp weather had set to full throttle.  We also had loads fun hiding about three months worth of my toilet roll inners all around her flat for Kev to find.  I hope we came up with suitably inventive and entertaining hiding spots for him!

And then it was back to the car docs to pick up the officially certified healthy Ernie.  And after this I never really managed to warm up!  I have been absolutely freezing all evening, much to my mother's great concern, who has been fussing over my chesty cough and my inability to warm up, and the fact that I feel absolutely exhausted, despite the best night sleep I've had in about a week and not the busiest day  (but it's nice sometimes to be fussed over and feel looked after! Even if I am nearly 26).  My feet have felt like icicles hanging on the end of my feet, despite socks and slippers and being tucked up under a fleece blanket folded over double.  Brrr!  I've kinda got the rest of me to stop shivering, but the feet are seeming to be a lost cause... oh well, hopefully, under two duvets and thick bed socks, come morning, things will have improved!

Lacking inspiration!

Hi!  I'm not feeling very inspired to write my blog tonight.  Which is strange, as for the first time in a few days, I actually have something to talk about!  Oh dear!  I'll blame the remnants of the cold that are still stalking me.  Although as previously mentioned, this cold (thank goodness) has definintely hit me much lighter than the one I had at the start of December, and I am bouncing back much quicker.  I'm all but over it now.  Just a hint of lingering tiredness and bunged-upness. 

After all my waffling last night about what to do today, I didn't really do any of it.  I didn't get up early enough to have my bath and hair wash session, I did drop my brother off, and then I decided to get pro-active about sorting my car out.  Unfortunately, it's that time of year again, when the ol' MOT is due.  And last year, when I had Ernie serviced they mentioned his back tyres were looking rather worn, and could do with being changed, but when I got a second opinion, they said they wouldn't bother if it were their car, so being the skint student that I am, I didn't.  But I have been aware of it all year, thinking all along that once I was working and had a steady income, I would sort it.  But that plan went south along with all the others that started with "when I start working properly and have proper money, I'll..."  So since my MOT was due later this week (booked for Wednesday, and dreading it, been stung too much in the past to have any other emotion about it!) I decided I'd get a jump start on things and sort out the tyres in my own time rather than being told and kinda forced into it due to a failed MOT.  Turns out they did need doing (shocker!) and the silly garage seemed to think they could take advantage of me (even bigger shocker!) - "we don't have any budget ones (this being a nationwide chain that advertises budget tires from £20),  we've run out, the ONLY ones we have would be £56... each."  To which I pulled a huge face and got up to leave, genuinely shocked, and determined I could get them cheaper elsewhere.  Then he shuffles around papers on his desk and goes "no wait, I've just remembered (mmmm, yeah right!) that we had a delivery earlier (are you kidding me?!?  It's a Bank holiday, I doubt you'd have recieved a delivery on a Bank holiday!) and I do have some budget ones, but they're the best quality of the budget ones, and would be £81, including the fitting and alignment"  This was somewhat better, so I gave in in the end, I tried the attempt to leave again thing, but this bargaining technique had apparently being exhausted!

After all this dirty, scamming, masculating stuff, I decided I needed some retail therapy, even if it was just in the browsing form, so, went and spent sometime at the nearest shop that sells wool.  (Yes, before you try and say anything, we have already established that I have a problem!)  I was very impressed with the fact that I didn't buy anything, the combined logic of (a) tight finances (b) stupid queues (c) absolutely no actual need and (d) a relatively poor selection, outweighed my rash impulses of "oooh, but there's 10% off in the sale!".  I feel this shows strength and progress!

Then I came and had a lovely bonding afternoon of watching Merlin on telly with my dad whilst he ironed and I knitted.  Hehe!  Such quality father/daughter time!  And then I headed round to the Clarks for a lovely evening of dinner, playing with the kids' toys (oh man, I do just sometimes wish I had a kid so I would have an excuse to play with toys and do random fun crafts and activities that would otherwise just be frowned upon!), reading great books - Sarah has great taste and finds fantastic books for her girls (another reason I wish I had a kid sometimes, to have the excuse to be enchanted and charmed by such beautiful books!) and playing on the Wii once the girls had gone to bed.  Hehe, I suck at Mario Kart, but I have given Morgan (age 3) a brain weight of over 1400g on Brain Academy, which I think is my biggest ever score, damn, and now a three year old gets the credit... ooooooh well! Hehehe!

Wow, considering how I started this post, I did find inspiration somewhere along the way.  Cool!