Spatial awareness and a bit of creative thinking have been called for, to accommodate a guest and a drum kit in to the spare room.
Yesterday was bright and clear, but cold;
Mr UHDD, had risen at 5:30 to go to the Lake District, for a bit of a Christmas hill bash with his fell running mates. Kindly he bought me a mug of tea before he left, I am not sure I really wanted to be awake at 05:50 on a Sunday morning, but I never turn down a mug of tea; in my experience you never know when you will be offered another one, and a mug of tea in the hand is worth two in the pot. There will be many more weekends like this, because Mr UHDD is about to take on a bit of a challenge, he thinks he has been ‘considering it’ for a few months now; I on the other hand have known for a few months now, that he ‘will do it.’
He is going to run a ‘Bob Graham’ two words, that sound innocuous, but translate to……
The Bob Graham Round of 42 peaks is one of the most demanding challenges in England.With a ascent of app’ 28,500ft and a app’ distance of 74 miles.
And did I mention that it’s all done in 24 hours? You will be hearing a lot more about this, I promise.
Christmas is going to a quiet affair, on the other hand we are having a house full at New Year, friends from near and far, no one will be driving or waiting for a taxi, so bed/ mattress space is needed. The boys and I take on the task of a bit of redistribution of the bedroom furniture, so that it is possible to get a full size drum kit and a guest in the spare room.
Ha ha, you think that the boys are having a drum kit for Christmas don’t you? Well the drum kit has been with us for over a year now, we have just never got round to sorting the room out around it. The drum kit was something of an unexpected arrival, we went out for lunch, with friends, on the other side of the Pennines, we took a bottle of wine and a bunch of flowers, and came back with a drum kit and a crate of War Hammer figures and one less cheque in the cheque book; however I drew the line at the pet lizard and a snake that they also tried to palm off on us, a big NO! Our friends boys, have now fledged, and have student loans to support, (is there much meat on a lizard and can you ‘bar-b-q’ a snake? come on lads show the same sort of initiative that your parents did when they were at uni)
So having dragged Ikea ’smorgasbord’ book cases and ‘Slartybartfast’,chests of draws around the house the boys and I are rather pleased with our efforts. I always said that my children would learn to play something like the flute of clarinet; something they could carry themselves, so how did we end up with a drum kit? Well like many of the parental ideals you start out with, like ‘my child will never eat junk food’ ( have you ever taken your kids to a bowling party?) or ‘ I would never allow my child will to sit in parental bed with a biscuit and a beaker of milk , watching cartoons on Sky TV, whilst parents sleep’ Oh yes you will if you are THAT exhausted, you will you, you will do ANYTHING to get another 1/2 hours sleep. (and in truth it doesn’t seem to have done them much harm.) In the end you give in, well just a little bit.
I rather like the drums and the advantage of an old farmhouse is that they have very thick walls and no neighbours
As an aside what we call the ’spare room’ and the ‘bunk room’ were when we moved here, one long ‘dormitory room’, running from front to back of the house, (most traditional farm ‘long houses’ are one room deep) that was until Mr UHDD did whizy things with a few meters of 2X2 and some plaster board and made the space more usable as two rooms; legend has it and whilst it may be a ’sepia tale’ the story goes, that when this was a working farm, they used the ‘dormitory room’ to raise turkeys in, to sell at Christmas, so if in the small hours of Christmas day there is a ghostly roll on the drums, that will be the ghost of turkeys past. Woooooohooooo, squawk.
Have a happy and peaceful Christmas
