Blood, sweat and tears

None of the above!

Alison and children arrived (very) late on Monday night. Ady had already gone up to bed and I’d already drunk plenty of wine to keep me awake while listening to all the music videos I linked to (and maybe done some dancing round the lounge too :lol:). Davies and Scarlett hadn’t gone to sleep until about 10.30pm, because they have always slept in their own rooms which since we’ve been back in Sussex have been on opposite ends of the house on different levels they don’t disturb each other once they’ve gone to their rooms regardless of whether they are asleep yet. But they love the idea of sleepovers and often ask to sleep in each others’ rooms which we almost always say no to. I think I’m going to start letting them do it a bit more though as they are so giddy when they are allowed to that it takes them bloody hours to get to sleep :roll:.

The evening finishing and the next morning starting are something of a blur, possibly because there weren’t many hours between the two 😳 😆 so Tuesday was a quietish day marked with a walk to the post office en masse in the middle and some baking of snickerdoodles helped by a changing conveyor belt of helpers at various points. Davies and Lije were not really removed from the X box all day but Davies was loving having someone to play his W&G with and between them with Davies’ familiarity of the game and Lije’s superior control skills they got way further than he’s ever got before so that was nice. 🙂 The dual controls on that game mean you work together rather than in competition with each other. There was also a play put on for us by all the children except Tarly which was most entertaining and amusing, particularly Davies’ reluctance to complete the Happily Ever After by getting married :lol:.

In the early evening Ady and I went off to give blood. When we arrived at the hall we both confessed to actually being slightly nervous as it was a first time for both of us. We were both called into seperate booths for initial finger prick testing and a clarification of the answers on our forms about drug use and sexual history which might put us at risk of diseases. The doctor who saw me was a real comedian, but in a very deadpan manner with a straight face throughout. He asked me to read the questions again to be sure my answers were all as I’d indicated and then said ‘I draw your attention in particular to question 4 – have you ever had sex with someone for drugs or money?’ – that also includes sleeping with pensioners in exchange for Argos gift vouchers’ – I looked at him and he said ‘well we are in Worthing!’. I asked if it also included Ratners coupons and he assured me that was OK and didn’t count! 😆 Which meant that when my drop of blood floated at the top of the test tube instead of ‘sinking like a bullet’ as it was supposed to we both looked a bit concerned. This meant that I had to have a further test to ensure I wasn’t anaemic. At which point I confess to fretting about the volume of alcohol I’d consumed in the previous 24 hours 😳 I got called into the next booth where the next doctor spent ages checking my veins before drawing more blood from my right arm to test some more. He said my iron levels needed to be 125 or something and mine was 126 so I was ok but only just (all went rather over my head but it was nothing to do with the Ratners vouchers or the dry white wine!). Ady and I got called to the beds for the blood-draining at the same time but while his went all smoothly mine was not to be. The guy struggled to find a vein and when he did stick the needle in it really hurt, like REALLY hurt, right down my lower arm with a real tugging feeling. I seriously don’t think I could have managed it for 10-15 minutes. He called over another two nurses and then said to be ‘does that hurt?’ and I admitted it did, so he took the needle out again. He said the vein was very deep and he might have caught a nerve or something. They couldn’t use the other arm because I’d already had the retest from that one so they are calling me back again in a couple of weeks. My arm really ached last night but is fine today, so no lasting damage. 🙂 I’ll probably take the children next time, I reckon they’d find it really interesting.

The children – specifically Tarly and Lulah took forever to go to sleep and Alison and I were almost early to bed ourselves. Almost :lol:.

Today we had a plan to go to the local park and meet up with Lucy but in the end Lucy just came here with Richard and Rebecca. It’s been a really nice day with Davies and Lije playing pretty much non stop X box, Tarly and Lulah holed up in Tarly’s bedroom for hours and all of the others playing various games. Alison cut my hair (under much pressure – it looks lovely but was a trim rather than a restyle) and then did Tilda’s too and inbetween we managed lots of chatting.

A lovely visit, as always. 🙂

The children conked out fairly quickly (unsurprisingly!) and I think I’m heading for bed pretty soon too. More socialising happening in the next couple of days before a quiet weekend.