Christmas Eve surprise
Dec. 24th, 2015 06:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shewhomustThe plan for tomorrow was that we would drive into Newcastle for S.'s traditional Christmas morning party: Buck's fizz and smoked salmon and as many of her friends who could leave the turkey in the oven and take a break while it cooked. And then she would load the dishwasher and come here with us for Christmas dinner, and we'd drive her home the next day. We've done this before, and it works well.
However.
At about three o'clock this afternoon I was washing up from lunch, and knocking back the bread dough and thinking that my next move was to go up to the spare room, replace the bookcase that we'd moved to give the builders access to the radiator and make up the spare bed - and then I should probably start to make the stuffing for the bird... when there was an almighty thump from the road outside, where, it turned out, a young man on a bicycle had failed to negociate the bend and cycled right up and over our car.
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durham_rambler brought him in and sat him down, and encouraged him to phone his mother. He was walking, but very shaken, had a nasty scrape on his arm and, though he was reluctant to admit this, an even nastier one on his leg. There is a very impressive dent right up the bonnet of the car (seriously, much more impressive than the one White Van Man made in the back) and another in the windscreen. The glass is crazed rather than shattered, but we aren't going to be driving that car anywhere until it's been fixed - and while our insurers were happy to provide a courtesy car, by the time we'd reached that stage, the person in charge of courtesy cars had gone home.
So, change of plan. S. will be abstemious at her party and drive here when it is over ("and I can start drinking then, can't I?"). I miss out on the party, but I have extra time for preparations tomorrow, which is why I have time to write this now. Our young cyclist is going to be very sore tomorrow, if no worse: his mother may well decide to take him to hospital to get that leg wound looked at. She, I think, is the person who comes off worst out of this (at least in the short term: ask me again when we've been without transport for a long weekend) having just yesterday taken her mother to hospital with a chest infection and confusion, and already having that to worry about.
And it looks as if we shall be having what we said we wanted, a quiet Christmas at home.
Here's not one but 12 Christmas cards for you: the Twelve cartoons of Christmas from the Guardian. Among a number of star illustrators, my favourite is still Shaun Tan's contribution.
However.
At about three o'clock this afternoon I was washing up from lunch, and knocking back the bread dough and thinking that my next move was to go up to the spare room, replace the bookcase that we'd moved to give the builders access to the radiator and make up the spare bed - and then I should probably start to make the stuffing for the bird... when there was an almighty thump from the road outside, where, it turned out, a young man on a bicycle had failed to negociate the bend and cycled right up and over our car.
durham_rambler brought him in and sat him down, and encouraged him to phone his mother. He was walking, but very shaken, had a nasty scrape on his arm and, though he was reluctant to admit this, an even nastier one on his leg. There is a very impressive dent right up the bonnet of the car (seriously, much more impressive than the one White Van Man made in the back) and another in the windscreen. The glass is crazed rather than shattered, but we aren't going to be driving that car anywhere until it's been fixed - and while our insurers were happy to provide a courtesy car, by the time we'd reached that stage, the person in charge of courtesy cars had gone home.So, change of plan. S. will be abstemious at her party and drive here when it is over ("and I can start drinking then, can't I?"). I miss out on the party, but I have extra time for preparations tomorrow, which is why I have time to write this now. Our young cyclist is going to be very sore tomorrow, if no worse: his mother may well decide to take him to hospital to get that leg wound looked at. She, I think, is the person who comes off worst out of this (at least in the short term: ask me again when we've been without transport for a long weekend) having just yesterday taken her mother to hospital with a chest infection and confusion, and already having that to worry about.
And it looks as if we shall be having what we said we wanted, a quiet Christmas at home.
Here's not one but 12 Christmas cards for you: the Twelve cartoons of Christmas from the Guardian. Among a number of star illustrators, my favourite is still Shaun Tan's contribution.
