Splice the mainbrace

I have a hygienist appointment today my first in 3 years!! I used to go every 6 months but I’ve developed a really bad gagging reflex, even when brushing my teeth, so we’ll see how far we get today.

Is Smallbone (no tittering please) not doing ok? I read the oatcake forum after a few games and he was getting some favourable comments!

Heavy rain and strong winds earlier but now we have blue skies and sun 10c. My team Southampton are away in the cup today, dreading the result with the way we have been performing lately. Our new manager Nathan Jones (sorry to bring back bad memories to the Stoke supporters) tries to play in a completely different way to what our players and whole club ethos is and it isn’t working. Oh well it’s only a game………

Touch wood I’ve never suffered from the consequences of eating curry but I only go as hot as madras 😊

I seem to remember that we paid £40 to increase the holiday cost limit. I would imagine it would be much the same for increasing the duration days but it is variable and you will only be 4 days over the limit so maybe less?

I think that the limit is 30 or 31 days, we go on a 28 day QM2 cruise next year and when we add flying out to Cape Town and staying in Sydney for a few days at the end will put us over the max time away. I will call up when renewal is due to pay an extra premium to extend the amount of days away covered, I called up last year to increase the cost limit as we have an expensive holiday coming up next month but will knock that off at the next renewal.

I had to claim on the Flexplus travel insurance 3 years ago when we had to cut short an organised tour and rush back from Vietnam at the start of covid lockdown. They were very efficient, after online claiming I had a call from them to confirm details and thought oh no they’re going to wriggle out of it but after a few minutes of the call they agreed the payout. They do allow one ‘free’ medication condition so declaring my statins didn’t increase the cost. Since we claimed and in common with other insurance companies nowadays, they seem to stress more to try and initially get money back from the travel company or credit card company (I don’t know how that works!) first for cancelled or curtailed holidays.

I'm drinking the ale now while watching the latest Downton film that we recorded a few days ago, my wife is having a cup of tea (she's doing dry January!), I'm doing cut down a bit January

Yes we live near Nantwich.

Seem to have got off lightly. 3 half price tree decorations for £7 total, oh and a local bottle of ale for me 🍺

Maybe if they wore a dickie bow with it😊 it’s what the upper crust would wear.

I’ll let you know what she comes back with! We still use the catchphrase from the Fast Show some years ago when we come back with something not planned, we say “better than that” like the husband did when coming back from shopping with things not on the list his wife had given him 😊

The temperature has steadily risen all morning and is now up to 9c but breezy and light rain. Wife has gone to Bridgemere (garden centre + outlet shops) for a mooch around ,apparently , but I wonder what she’ll come back with! I’m just doing some jobs around the house, I need to set up a new printer that we bought a few weeks ago but after being confident with tech I’ve become a bit of a technophobe lately and concerned that I’ll do something wrong. We’ve started to take some Christmas decs down, the forecast is currently showing a dry day tomorrow so I’ll probably bring the outside lights in then.

we watched this the other day on Gold and brought back memories. I think it was first broadcast in 1993 and our first cruise was on QE2 in 1992. Merry Christmas everyone 🍷🥃

That’s a bit unfair. Our tree is predominantly gold and red with many Christmas decorations from places that we have visited around the world over the years which are various colours. My wife decorates the tree, I’m not allowed anywhere near it while being decorated apart from assembling the tree and putting the lights on!!😊

My wife and I still have our vinyl LPs and in my case lots of 12 inch singles from the early 80s. We haven’t played them since we last moved house 22 years ago! And the separates hifi is in the loft as well since we moved. We would consider selling them but I’d have to play each one to assess how warped or scratched they are first which would take a long time.

Yes I’m feeling!😊

Fun Christmas animation below. You used to be able to click on each reindeer to make them start and stop their noises but I think that is not available anymore.

We received one Christmas card just now 1st class and post marked 15th December, so got here fairly quickly considering.

So far we have received far fewer than normal but I think many are still ‘in the post’. I had an nhs letter on Saturday that had taken 12 days to arrive and my son sent a parcel to a friend (secret Santa) on 29th November and still hasn’t arrived. I think that they worked last Friday and Saturday after last weeks strike days and this week until Friday so maybe the backlog can be cleared somewhat.

Arvia is just arriving in Southampton.

A balmy 2c here and all of the white frost has gone in the past hour. Heating is coping better today, during our coldest day on Thursday (-10 to -1c) the boiler was on virtually all day and used £18 of gas!! We have the MIL round today for lunch today (pork cooked in cider and apple with mash and cabbage), normally she comes round for Sunday lunch but there is a risk of snow tomorrow morning so we are avoiding travelling out.

-7 here at the moment but has risen a degree the last hour or so, that should be the end of the extreme night temperatures for the foreseeable. I’m meeting up this afternoon with some ex work colleagues (I retired a few years ago) for a few drinks I’m really looking forward to meeting them again and catching up with company news and gossip.

-7 to -8 here this morning 13c in the house heating kicked in and touch wood it stays on. Heating failed one year on Christmas Eve and it mentally scarred me 😊 I can’t wait until the milder weather arriving in a few days time.

i don’t have that problem, if I click on the thread title it takes me to latest page or click on the latest page number. I often click on the most recent poster on the right hand side and the scroll up from there to where unread posts start since I last viewed the thread.