Joanie’s blog

As if the news wasn't depressing enough in itself, there was a lead story this morning which claimed that taking vitamin supplements could end your life prematurely.

It's probably fortunate that I am not a creature of habit - when I clear out the medicine cupboard (every 3 years or so), there are always masses of vitamins, glucosamine capsules and various other pills that are long past their use-by date because I've forgotten to use them.

I must admit I persuade my daughters to take zinc or echinacea if I think they need an immune boost. Another guilt trip for mummies all around the World.

Sarah had an accident 9 days ago and cut her hand on a drinking glass. She now realises why it's not recommended to use glass around a hot tub, specially when the path is icy and you have wet feet!

It was only water - it's amazing how many people have asked if she was drunk!

The cut was on the palm of her hand, really deep and jagged. I've since learned that if you don't get a cut stitched within 24 hours, it's no use, so she had 4 steristrips and a bandage, which has had to be changed by a nurse every couple of days. I think if it had happened at home I would have taken her to A&E, but she was at a friend's house at the time.

Luckily, it's still the Easter holidays so school isn't a problem. Today we went to the 8am surgery and the nurse took the dressing off to encourage her hand to heal. It looks really nasty, probably worse because she's had an iodine dressing on that turned her hand a kind of tobacco-stained yellow. We've been advised to put vitamin E cream on the wound to reduce scarring.

Anyway, to take our minds off things we decided to go to Berkshire yesterday to see family and to shop. It was nice to spend some time together and the shopping centre in Reading is pretty good. Sarah was looking for a dress for a summer party and I wanted a handbag, and some summer clothes. I never try anything on because I hate changing rooms, but hopefully my purchases will fit. As usual, I intend to drop a dress size by the summer, but bought a size bigger than I am "for comfort", which means I feel guilty for not going to the gym much recently.

Three hours after our arrival at The Oracle, we staggered to the car, stopping only for a box of Krispy Kreme doughnuts to take home with us.

Good job I bought a size bigger, I think!

Today is the first day of Spring, apparently. And it's bloody cold. And wet.

It's a shame that the summers in England are so short, because warm hazy days just make everyone happier and more relaxed. Everything just seems better when the sun shines.

When I was a kid I remember endless summers with loads of sunshine and lashings of ginger beer. Running in fields of gold with a bunch of good mates and picnicking by a stream. Actually, that isn't far from the truth - I can remember fishing for sticklebacks in the park with my brothers and buying a whole box of ice pops with my friend and devouring them at the swing park till our lips burnt and we felt sick.

Both my parents used to work, so the summer holidays were a time when I had almost total freedom. Some of the things we did were perhaps a bit dodgy. Playing in abandoned cars, visiting the mad old man who lived in the flats and accepting orange squash from him. "Babysitting" for a toddler we didn't really know, who just tagged along while we played in the park. Going to see a dead badger in a field and having my first snog (with the boy who invited me to go to the field). This was only a few decades ago, but how times have changed. As long as I came home for 5pm, when my mum was home from work, there were no questions asked.

I don't think my kids had the freedom I had as a child. I drove them everywhere and if they had friends to play it was mostly in the back garden or on organised trips to clubs and classes. Where we used to live, there was a field at the top of the road where kids hung out, but they were almost within eyesight and I always knew where they were and who they were with. Admittedly, I didn't go out to work when they were young. I was a stay at home mum for the early years and then found jobs that fitted in with nursery and school, or worked from home.

Miraculously, now my girls are older they are remarkably independant. It probably happened gradually, with trips alone to the local shops, then into town, getting the train into London to shop with friends, attending parties, and now one of them is at university and living away from home, cooking, cleaning and responsible for herself. The youngest is at sixth form and gets herself up to catch the bus, prepares her own lunch and could easily fend for herself.

I'm proud of them both. In fact, they are probably more confident than I was at their age, neither of them is afraid to stick up for what they believe in or work to get what they want.

Maybe I didn't do such a bad job! How the heck did that happen? 

I hate my feet! I have really long toes and narrow feet, which some people have described as elegant, but I see them more as bony and dinosaur-like.

I don't think I could ever wear beautiful sandals, although I love shoes. Women with dinky little feet are so lucky.

Anyway, I just gave myself a treat and soaked my feet, gave them a lovely treatment with apricot scrub and smothered them in cream, putting cotton socks on to let it soak in.

It's really nice to have the time to do things like this, and to enjoy life a little bit rather than being on the work treadmill. I think sometimes that the focus is on working and earning money, without taking the time to actually enjoy life.

I am a bit bored though...

Show us your favorite artist.

Dali: Dream of a Virgin

I wish I knew more about gardening.

We have a man who comes in once a week to cut the lawn, tidy up, trim things. He's worth every penny, and probably saves my garden from a lot of anguish as I have a tendancy to massacre shrubs and kill plants. You know, you chop a bit off, then tidy it up, cut a bit off the other side to even things up, before you realise, you're left with a stick.

A tree blew over in the wind. I think it's a eucalyptus, it's very pretty and healthy looking, apart from the fact that it's leaning over.

Do we chop it down, prop it up, pull it out?

Or leave it?

Gardening is one of those talents, like cookery, that ought to be handed down through the generations.

Do you think real love can last throughout any distance, or will long distance end most relationships? 
Submitted by Miss Joy.

I don't think distance matters as much today. When lovers were parted in years gone by, they would have to write letters to keep in touch and wait days or weeks for a reply. With that internet thing, Skype, mobile phones, and cheap international calls, there is no reason why people can't sustain a relationship long distance.

Love can mean more than physically being together.

For quite a few years I've worked from home. It's been great, mostly. Heck, some days I didn't even get dressed!

The problem is that I'm not one of those terribly organised people who keep all their mess in the study and stop work when work is supposed to finish for the day. Time flies and meals are missed.

I'm a person who curses the blessing of wireless because I can curl up on the sofa surrounded by paperwork, with the laptop burning into my thighs, risking injury because I'm not at all in a healthy physical position. It's quite funny that, when I first started working from home, health and safety checks were carried out to ensure that your keyboard was at the correct angle and that your chair was suitable for the job. I used to spend hours locked away in the study, glued to my computer.

Anyway. For the past week I've been unemployed (by choice!). I have a sort of freedom, perhaps the kind you feel when you've been released from jail. I can wake up in the morning and (after the school run and taking John to the station), have a cup of tea or coffee and even read the paper. Logging on means reading through less than a dozen emails, rather than the dozens that arrived when I was working for a living. I can talk to friends on instant message and actually have a decent conversation without trying to send polite one-liners saying I'll catch up later. I can cook proper meals that involve peeling and preparing, rather than crashing at 9pm with a bottle of wine and a quick bowl of pasta.

I can clean the toilet. Properly. Even the underside of the lid and the bits around the hinges.

I know a lot of this sounds pathetic, but because I have time to actually do all this I feel a lot more relaxed.

There is a slight feeling of guilt. I don't have babies or toddlers and I'm not retired, so I "should" be doing something. When I went to the shops today, I hesitated before buying anything exotic because I felt as if I ought to be more careful with spending. But I didn't need to spoil myself anyway, I have something money can't buy.

Time.

Predictions are that I will be bored within a fortnight - but I am determined to prove them wrong.

Valentine's Day is sneaking up on us again. Roses will be quadrupling in price and local restaurants will have special menus. Men will be buying inappropriate underwear for their loved ones in various shades of red, black and purple and sending cards with cheesy poems inside.

I might sound a bit cynical, but after being married for a million years and having a body ravaged by two pregnancies, romance isn't something that figures large in my life.

Having said that, what is romance? I am lucky enough to be with someone who doesn't mind getting up early and bringing me cereal and a cup of tea in bed every morning. There isn't a rosebud in a vase, or a glass of champagne on the tray, but it's still thoughtful.

I don't find love notes around the house, but he does take the dustbins out every week, and cleans up the catsick if I am feeling ugh! about it.

Do we really need one special day a year to celebrate love?

Maybe I'm just missing out on a whole new World and I just don't know it.

It seems more than a year since my dad died, but it's actually a year in two weeks time.

There's an odd feeling when both your parents have passed away. Although my dad was unable to speak on the phone for the last few years of his life because he'd lost his voicebox through cancer, so I don't miss his phonecalls in the same way I did when my mum died, I still miss that feeling that nobody can offer you the kind of unconditional acceptance that a parent can.

I say acceptance and not love, because my dad wasn't really a loving sort of parent. But he did have life in perspective and I respected him a lot.

So, it's been a year but his headstone isn't in place yet. We called the people this morning and hope that it will be neat and tidy in time for people to visit on the anniversary.

I'm aware that life is short. Not to be wasted.

Loads of my friends are pregnant as well - what is going on? More than one of them is in their 40s. I'm not pregnant... but I'm very excited on their behalf.

Life goes on and I probably have a few decades left. Time to do all those things that you're supposed to do before you die.

I can't think of any offhand...!