Meeting at Neurosupport 27/04/09 12-2.30pm

Don't forget the next volunteers meeting at the centre on Monday 27th April

Starting with lunch at 12 noon and the meeting to start at 12.30pm all being well and finish by 2.30pm

Their are 10 items on the agenda but if you don't make it look out for "The Neuro News" with all the minutes and discussion about the meeting and of course I will put the "News" in this Blog

Hope to see you all on the day Ta for now

Alan

5 seconds more

In some ways writing as I do sometimes thinking of what to write sometimes that just comes out in how things happen
This weekend gone Sally and me went on a weekend break one of those deals that you see in the weekend papers and a good deal it was, staying at Wetherby, not far from York and Harrogate so Betty's Teashop is always on the agenda NOT too much money to spend on a cup of tea and cakes although last year we did succumb to Betty's finest and fine they were but for a very large hole at the end of the tea in my wallet, but I am losing the thread of what I wanted to say.
The weekend was looked forward to for some time and the prospect of good weather can always be left to chance at this time of year but the forecast was good all we had to do is turn up and go driving was not a problem as York is only about 100 miles away not too long for the old man (that's me) to drive.

However things did not go to plan, we did have our weekend away but not as we thought Sally was not well and a visit to the doctor confirmed what we all know now as a virus infection congestion in the lungs the antibiotics should work in time well maybe not they only had 2 days to work on a course of 5 days although the coughing was not that bad was it?
We did make the weekend but not doing as much as we would normally do.

Well the gods on that Sunday 19th April were looking after us both on our way back we would go via Skipton and then on to Colne Boundary Mill for that last pair of shoes/dress/coat/hat you name it they have got it that we must buy. Should only take us an hour after breakfast were my words ,however I do have a nickname "Biggles" which involves a broken car/a semi-final and getting lost on the way home maybe more of that story another time it's a great one to tell over a few pints, and yes we did take a wrong turning somewhere which leads me to a crossroads in a major road at lights waiting for them to change and on a hill, I was going straight across but out the corner of my eye I saw another car as my lights changed green going very fast and heading for the junction I was crossing, I was able to stop as I was only going slow as the other car went through the red light and collided with a car that was going in the opposite direction to me.

So 5 seconds more would have been a different story as the car would surely have collided with the passenger side of our car and I may have not been writing this blog now. Luckily no one was hurt although both cars will need a bit more than a day getting repaired.

Things like that leave you wondering about life and things

Are we getting old ?

As my brother Jeff embarks at last on his journey that started sometime ago his move to live in Spain with his wife Lydia who is Spanish, his journey has been a long and difficult one.

Growing up as we did when we were young in the shadow that is Anfield for me 10 years for him only 6 years and then like all who lived in the terrace house with an outside toilet and no hot water or central heating we moved to a place that we did not know about, Kirkby( I have spelt it the way it was when we first moved and how my mum would always say that we we came from Kirkby not Kirby) a land of high rise flats and lots of green spaces and also lots of us, that is under 16years of age and living in Kirkby, at one time if I remember correctly the biggest population of under 16years old in Europe, some year in the early sixties I'm not sure what year or if that information is right or is it just an urban myth that grew up around where we lived.

In those days it always had a bad press(you had to pay the taxi driver first before he would set off to take you hometo Kirkby)and in later years as well I remember an incident when by now I was working at running pubs, a new manager from the brewery who I was talking to at a conference mentioned that he had been round Kirkby and likened it to Beruit with all the bars on windows and barbed wire on the pubs he had visited , a look of despair,I had to remind him that lots of good people lived in Kirkby and especially 3, my mum, dad and brother: he walked away muttering to himself about me, but for my brother you see unlike myself who has moved around this city,7 times since leaving Kirkby in the early seventies, he has never left his home where we first went to all those years ago.

Now for him and myself 50 years have passed and as I visited the house maybe for the last time with my wife yesterday to go out for a meal with my brother and his wife, I look around the house filled with boxes and memories of happy and some sad,times when we lived there together with my mum and dad,who are both no longer with us, so Are we getting old ? I think so but as my brother and his wife embark on a new chapter in ther lives our home will now fill with other peoples new memories of hopes and dreams maybe similar to those of my mum and dad when we first went there all those years ago in 1958.

So now I wish my brother and his wife well in their new start in Spain and maybe in the future you will see pictures of us all together enjoying the sun in Spain.