Blog for Friday 10th November 2023

Yahee! Today we are off to visit our friends – Daphne and Ken – in Port Macquarie this afternoon! Ken (our friend and not my man) had a spinal stroke about a year ago or so and is now paralyzed from his waist down and so he has to remain in a frail care facility, which is proving very difficult for him to accept. That places a huge weight on Daphne’s shoulders as she has to keep reminding him that she is unable to lift him out of his wheelchair and therefore he cannot come home any time soon, if ever – something she hates having to do and which she is paying a heavy toll for. She is just skin and bones, poor lady. Very sad.

When I had my Quiet Time this morning Shamara, my feline, managed to jump up onto my desk and snuggle down alongside my laptop for some undiluted attention – loves, hugs, strokes and tickles. Every time I stopped, she would very gently hold my hand in her paw to request a little more love and attention. Very cute.

I went downstairs later and had a shower and got myself dressed for a day out. I woke Ken up at twenty to nine as the day was slowly tick-tocking by, plus he had much to do before we could leave the farm.

Today we had to push out the other quad bike as that too was not working even though Ken had tried so hard to get it going. He, again, lifted the quad bike onto the back of the ute’ using the tractor to do so, so we could take said bike through to Norm’ to get it repaired.

We left the farm just after eleven o’clock and headed into Wauchope where our first stop was the bakery. I hopped out the ute’ and went into the bakery to choose some delicious delicacies to take for afternoon tea at Daphne and Ken’s this afternoon.

The bakery was a hive of industry, and the queue was long and busy. I eventually got into the shop and as I pointed to a cake of my choice a man on my immediate left said, “Good choice!” Initially I did not think he was addressing me, so I continued and chose another cake too. This man then said, “Oh, they will love that cake too. You do realize don’t you that I am watching your every move?” I then whipped around to speak to this man - and I do not think that my thoughts right then would have been printable as I thought this man very rude and rather forward! But as I turned to deal with this man, I instantly recognized our good friend Peter, who was there picking up a lovely cake for his wife, Val, for her birthday tomorrow! The wicked man! He loved it that he had caught me unawares!

From the bakery we headed into Port Macquarie and to Spotlight as I wanted to get new cake tins, seeing my one cake tin has mysteriously been raptured or gone missing. I am thrilled that I managed to get two really nice ones.

Ken and I then had a quick bite to eat – Ken had a bacon and egg roll with a coke and I had a toasted cheese and tomato sandwich with a pure fruit juice for our lunch at the little café alongside Spotlight.

Then it was time to visit Daphne and Ken. When we arrived there (I had had to phone Daphne as I could not for the life of me remember the number of their home! Age!) Tony, our pastor and friend was already there.

What a lovely afternoon Ken (my man) and I had with Ken, Daphne and Tony, and the cakes were good too. Both Ken's and Daphne ate their date cake, but I found it, with a caramel and cream cheese topping, a little too rich but delicious all the same, and Tony seemed to enjoy the lemon gluten-free cake too.

We all had a good discussion and hopefully we all gained something from it. Tony is going to attempt to get the frail care home to allow a church service one morning a month there. That would be a great encouragement for Ken (Daphne’s Ken, I think.) All in all it was a great afternoon spent with really good friends.

Ken and I had to wave a fond farewell to our friends at just after half past three as it looked as if the farm may be getting a deluge of rain (hopefully!)

We still had the small quad bike on the back of the ute’ so Ken wanted` to offload it at Norm’s for him to fix it. Ken had warned me that Norm’ was probably not going to be at home so I would have to help him, (my Ken) get the quad bike off the back of the ute'! Wonderful!

But when we got there, Norm; was home! Shoo! What a relief for me! While the men were chewing the fat and glaring at said bike I went and sat outside with Fanny (Norm’s wife). How good is this? Norm’ fixed the small quad bike while it was still on the back of the ute’! Now we had both quad bikes repaired, so Norm’ suggested that Ken use his trailer and take both bikes home.

With much huff and puff the three men (a friend of Norm’s had popped across for a chat) pushed the trailer out of the yard, through the gates and down to our ute’ on the road, but … when they got there, there was no tow hitch on the back of our ute’ as Paddy had taken it off when he put the barbed wire thingie (using the tow hitch) away, and Ken had not checked to see if the tow hitch was still on!

As you can well imagine, with more huff and puff, and many meaningful shakes of the heads, rolling of eyes and much muttering, the three men pushed said trailer back up, and we had to leave the big quad bike there with Norm’ and Fanny to be picked up another day!

Ken and I were hoping that the farm had had a lot of rain, but we were disappointed as that was not so. We had had 4.5mm of rain only, but hey! We had had 4.5mmof rain, people! Every drop counts.

It was good to be home again, and I made a very light supper for us – avocado mashed on toast, covered with savory mince and topped with grated Parmesan cheese. It just filled that tiny space that demanded to be fed!

I watched the end of one episode of SAS Australia and that made my going to sleep late, but … I so enjoyed the episode, so it was well worth staying up late!

What lesson did I learn today? Sometimes in life we are told to ‘Wait!’ and how we wait reveals a lot about ourselves.

What am I grateful for today? Time spent with good friends.

My saying for today is …