Is this thing on?

Hmm, so Friday I took Mum up to Gloucester for an appointment with the consultant.

This was a follow up from her stay in hospital in July. At the time they found she had an aneurysm in her stomach and the consultant has told her she needs surgery to sort it. There’s not really an option as without the surgery it would almost certainly prove fatal within a couple of years tops. The problem is, she’s still not in the best of health since her previous hospital visit and this last couple of weeks in particular have been quite difficult as she’s not been feeling well so the thought of a pretty serious operation in the near future isn’t helping matters much.

Still, there’s nothing much we can do other than wait it out and hopefully keep her spirits up until she has the op (should be some time in December) but suffice to say it’s all a bit distracting at the mo so apologies in advance if I’m a bit out of the loop..

written by RiK \\ tags: family, health

See, here’s the thing. I don’t do gardening. Not even a little bit. We have a blike in a van who comes once a week to do the lawns and generally tidying up in the garden. The one place he’s never ventured though, and nor have I in at least a year, is the greenhouse.

You know the Eden project down in Cornwall, or perhaps Biosphere in the states? Well they’ve got nothing on the ‘experiment’ going on in out greenhouse.

See:




And yes, it really is *full* of natures wonders, completely untouched by human hands. As you can see, Callum was the most intrepid explorer..

et voila! a little over an hour later..

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I think we can chalk that one up to a productive afternoon then!

written by RiK \\ tags: family, home, Projects

Someone’s got such a hard life. She’ll be expecting me to peel her a grape next!

written by RiK \\ tags: cat, family, Pictures

One of the downsides of self-employment is going stir-crazy from spending all day in the office at home. That’s why getting out once is a while is essential for my sanity, even if it’s just to pop into town to chat with a mate. Going out for a proper grown-up night out is a rare treat that I’m really starting to miss these days.

I’m proper gutted tonight because it was the first night out I’d been really looking forward to in ages, well actually the first night out we had planned in just about as long as I can remember and Kel gets a stinkger of a head cold and has to bale. It’s not like we can just go some other time as it’s a friend’s band’s gig tonight and so that’s me doing billy-no-mates (as usual) then.

Getting to feel like a bit of a habit this is

written by RiK \\ tags: family

Mischief went for a little visit to see her Mummy…

..cue lots of running around the house playing chase!

written by RiK \\ tags: Cats, family

… loves her new mummy

written by RiK \\ tags: buttons, Cats, family, Pictures

Hee hee.. Kel’s just acquired a bengal too.

Meet ‘Buttons’.

Even better, she’s Mischief’s mummy

written by RiK \\ tags: Cats, family

Ok nom nom

written by RiK \\ tags: cake, callum, family

I love roller coasters, and so I was well chuffed that the weather held out yesterday and we managed to get in all of the big rides at Alton Towers, some twice, before lunch.

Pleasantly surprised that having got there early they let us in 30 mins early and we managed to get straight on some of the rides an hour before they were meant to be even running. This meant we also got a couple of rides on Oblivion with no queuing and could save our fast track tickets for later for ride #3.

RITA and Air were the two ‘biggies’ that we were looking forward to and they didn’t disappoint. Managed to blag a couple of goes on Rita, sat right at the front each time too Air was awesome, you’re effectively lying face down and so from your POV it’s like your flying, except of course, having actually done a lot of that for real, it’s not

Ooh - unexpected surprise of the day, ‘Hex’. It’s not a big ride as such, and it’s easy to see how they’ve done it, but man does it fuck with the senses. Well worth queuing up for that one

written by RiK \\ tags: Alton Towers, family, Pictures, rollercoaster, theme park

written by RiK \\ tags: A pic a day, family, Pictures