"You never were a fashionista" says the voice inside my head.
"Very true but I did try," I reply.
"Well you didn't make a very good job of it," comes the response.
So let's start with hair. Hair (here) today and gone tomorrow. I don't have a lot of it now but that makes it easy to control or not in my case.
I used to have floppy blow away hair. I know this as I've got photos of me with floppy blow away hair. As a teenager the floppy blow away hair annoyed me as it kept getting in my eyes. Nobody told me that by cutting it shorter in the front it would not flop over my eyes. I may be able to add and subtract vast numbers and calculate pi to many parts but working out how to stop hair going into my eyes was a foreign country to me.
Back in the late 60s and early 70s the fashion was to have long hair. At school we had to have relatively short hair but once the shackles were off we could dance so to speak.
I don't think I ever made a definite decision to grow my hair long, but there I am in a restaurant in Spain with a couple of mates with hair down to my shoulders.
Same at college, although it was slightly shorter by then although there were no hard and fast rules. It continued to be fly away and was pretty uncontrollable. Then something happened apart from it beginning to drop out and turning grey. It became uncontrollable in a different way. It stopped flopping and became spikey. It stuck up in an alarming way and made me look like a mad professor or an eccentric. I've always wanted to be an eccentric as it allows you to get away with doing potty things.
"Oh don't worry about him. He's just eccentric," people would say.
But there was something holding me back from being eccentric and that was this small voice in the back of my head that continually said: "You're being stupid."
"Stupid is as stupid does."
So I can't be an eccentric and I can't wear my hair long without looking ridiculous. So what can I do? Well I can be a fashionista, looking trendy and getting admiring glances from everyone declaring "wow look at how smart he is."
And there's only one thing stopping me from doing that and that something is the me that decides before I go out that I'm going to chuck on any old thing.
I have a wardrobe brimming with clothes I never wear. All kinds of clothes, although I never go clothes shopping. Left on my own in a town or city I always gravitate to libraries and book shops. It used to be CD shops but now it's all downloads at home. I never gravitate to clothes shops. So how do I have so many clothes? Well the other four fifths will come home with something, but primarily I received hand me ups from my sons. Eldest son will turn up with a bin bag full of clothes he's discarding. He is a bit of a fashionista.
So I pick out a couple of shirts and other bits and pieces, ignoring the trousers as they are always far too long. The rest goes to the charity shop but of course as we all know charity starts at home.
But then things stay in my wardrobe untouched for years until I decide to wear something and then I wear it to death. I'll wear the same hoodie for months with just the occasional wash when the other four fifths demands I give it a rest. Or maybe she isn't talking about the clothes!
I have never been the slightest bit fashion conscious. When he lived on his own, my father was always fastidious in the way he dressed. He always looked smart so we assumed that his bungalow was smart as well only to find when he went into a home that it wasn't the case and the reason he always came to ours and never invited us to his was because the heating had packed up along with other things that we had to sort out before we could sell it. I was definitely at fault there.
I have become accustomed to the fact that I will never become a fashion icon in the same way that I have become accustomed to having holes in my socks because I have this ridiculous toe arrangement where my big toe folds over the next toe and points upwards, thus making regular holes in cheap socks which then have to be thrown away. Never stopped me being able to run pretty fast though.
But enough about fashion. A quick observation. Is the number of keys that a person has on their key ring an indication of their importance? I currently have a car key and a house key on my keyring which I guess doesn't make me very important. The other four fifths has a veritable plethora of keys jangling on her key ring. I make no further comment other than to say that I have a bottle opener on my keyring which makes me very popular when somebody needs to open a bottle of beer and realises they have left their opener behind.
On Wednesday I did my second stint on the desk at the Norfolk Family History Society in Norwich. The first stint was rather boring but this week's saw quite a few people coming in and some needed help. A genial gentleman from Canada popped in to take out a 10 year membership and we had a good old chat about the differences between the UK and Canada and, get this, he said things were much cheaper and easier over here. He obviously hasn't tried to get a medical appointment.
Did have a lovely visit to Canada where we crossed the country on a bus. Started in Calgary and went to Banff, Kamloops, Vancouver and a number of other places before cruising to Alaska. Must look out some photos of that trip for you. One thing I remember was struggling with walking after sustaining a painful ankle injury playing cricket before we set off.
Kirby Hall which is the HQ of the society has a small car park. On a good day you can probably get about eight vehicles in but that would involve some of them trapping others in. Opposite the car park is a tiny piece of chained off land where one vehicle can be parked and possibly two, although I'm not sure about that. This piece of land is up for sale for £50,000. Yes you did read that correctly - £50,000.
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Couldn't help thinking yesterday about our coming travels for this year. In a few weeks we are off to Staffordshire for a week and we have a few other trips sorted out but it's the day trips I was thinking about. It seems ages since we went to Southwold - a place very dear to my heart. When I was having a few problems some years ago, I found a trip to Southwold rejuvenating. Roll on the proper spring weather.
Sometimes the silliest trips are the ones you remember. A couple of years ago (seems like yesterday) we took a bus from Hethersett to Brundall just because we could and the fact that it's on the same bus route and we have free bus travel. So we got off in Brundall, had a look round the church and walked to the Marina where they had a coffee shack. Drank coffee and had a bacon roll and then sat in the sunshine overlooking the Broad and had a read. We then had a walk and found an idyllic place with a seat overlooking the river. We chatted to a guy on his boat who turned out to be an Opera singer. I Googled him when we got home. I was fascinated to hear about his career and we exchanged email addresses and agreed to meet the next year if he was sailing our way. To date that meeting hasn't taken place but I would like to retrace my steps of that day in Brundall. We left a touch early as I seem to remember that I had a dental appointment. Next time if the weather behaves itself we will spend longer there with no reason to hurry home.
I'm strange where trips and holidays are concerned. I enjoy being away but am always looking towards being back home. I enjoy being at home but am always looking forward to the next trip. Not sure whether that makes me a contented or uncontented person - someone who is never satisfied with where they are or someone who adapts well to wherever they are.
As I write this, in my mind's eye I'm at Southwold or Brundall or Cromer or many other places. But when I'm there in my mind's eye I'm back home. Does that make any sense at all?
On Wednesdays the other four fifths goes off to art. I'm not sure whether her group does much painting or drawing or whether it's an excuse to chat and have coffee. Sometimes when she's out I'm happy just to lock myself away and write. On other occasions I feel like going out and being sociable. Yesterday was one of the latter.
There is the possibility of starting up a daytime table tennis group in the Methodist Church Hall. I used to help run a Friday evening table tennis group for all ages. Richard G is considering starting up the new group and needed to see what equipment already existed and I had access through the other four fifths keys to a cupboard that may well have had table tennis equipment. See having that fat wedge of keys does sometimes help.
There are three decent table tennis tables and we found some nets and bats. Richard, who I have known for decades, asked whether I thought there would be any call for daytime sessions for retired people rather than evening sessions.
My view is that there may well be. So many people are like me and don't really want to go out on the evenings, particularly when it's cold and dark but we would be happy to have a game during the day. Richard has gone away to do some costings etc.
So after unlocking the delights of the cupboard and then locking them up again, I walked down to the library for no other reason than I like walking and sitting in libraries. Today I started reading a weighty tome entitled "The Dawn of Everything. A new history of humanity." Not sure I will read it but it looks good on the shelf at home. Just jesting I will try to read at least some of it.
From there I went to the Methodist church where they do coffee every Wednesday morning. I can't see a coffee machine without thinking of the word barista and an advert on television. The advert is for dental hygiene and features a young black man who has turned his life around. He tells us he has been trained to be a barista. In other words he has been instructed on how to work a coffee machine.
As soon as I walked through the door there was talk about my daily blog, which most of the people there read. Somebody wanted to know how to sign up. I warned them they would be subjecting themselves to the most terrible rubbish imaginable.
Tonight we are going to see the musical Legally Blonde at Hethersett Academy. Tell you about it tomorrow.