Well, it took me by surprise as I’m sure it did everyone else. Nobody could have predicted how good it would be even if they had known about it. It was totally left field.
I really liked the song the first time I heard it with ut realising who it was. But then I found out ‘Beyonce goes Country’.
I’m not sure whether it’s the same as when Dylan went electric but even so.
I must confess apart from her song about putting a ring on it, I’m not sure I can name too many other of her hits nor do I have an encyclopaedic knowledge of her. I know she has a daughter and is or was married to a Rapper (cannot recall which one other than its not Stormzy or anyone from the SugarHill Gang or even Ant and Dec), But I do have a secret penchant for Country Music. Not all the time but I do sometimes tune into Smooth Country whilst driving alone in the car – alone as Karen really cannot stand it. I do like much of the Country cross over music which the Beyonce track falls into.
Anyhow we have only been back 3 weeks and we are getting ready to be off again, this time to Iceland with Barry & Ellie. We have not been able to persuade Neil to join us as to quote him ‘What’s the point of going somewhere cold’. He has a point but we have always wanted to try to see the Northern Lights and it doesn’t happen in warmer climes.
It has been period of numbers since we got home from our big adventure around the other side of the world. It took me 8 nights to get over the jet lag. We have had to fit in 2 months of being at home in just 3 weeks. Karen fitted in 6 days’ work. I saw 8 City goals in 2 matches at Carrow Road including 4 whilst enjoying Hospitality in a Corporate box. We saw ‘Six’ at the Theatre after a lovely meal at Prelude with Ellie and her Mum. We had 1 trip to London to see Cabaret at The Kit Kat Club in London which far exceeded our expectations. We celebrated 2 birthdays. Karen’s had a walk, followed by brunch at The Goat Shed and then seeing ‘Priscilla’ at Cinema City and a Pizza afterwards. For Neil’s birthday, the 5 of us went to The Ivy for a very nice meal.
I played 3 very wet underfoot rounds of golf at 3 different courses with 3 different people. I met up with 8 different lots of friends for a cuppa and or food at 6 different places. We had 1 day out with Tracey & Graham and visited Glenn & Al in their new abode.
We both had dental appointments although mine was considerably cheaper than Karen’s as she started a series of treatments estimated to cost £1500.
There was just the 1 long holiday booked (although we did reschedule another one). We have booked our flights back to New Zealand for another month next January. This time we are going straight there and back but via LA again. Karen has had the dining room table covered with maps and guides planning our of route and schedule. There are many new places we want to visit as well as going back to some places we really enjoyed on previous visits.
Just writing all that down makes me realise why I haven’t managed many other things on my ever growing ‘to do’ list.
Sadly, during this time my sister Lynda moved into a Care Home. It was a heart wrenching decision for everyone but the right decision for her and certainly for Tony who had done so well in looking after her up until this point. On a similar note, Karen was informed that due to her Mum’s dementia getting worse that she would now need to be moved from her Care Home to a specialist dementia one, a process which has now been kicked off.
As you may have noticed I am still using the same website. My project to get it lifted and shifted by an independent contractor failed miserably. Without going into lots of detail (and as in the case of most outsource contracts) the person concerned over promised and under delivered. I did even resort to writing to him at one point saying that ‘In my day we would never consider handing something to the customer without testing it first’. And ‘No – I won’t release the funds in escrow so you can sort things out once the site is live’. Anyhow after independent arbitration which was agreed in fully my favour, all the money I had paid into escrow is being returned. So, it’s a case of if you want a job doing properly – do it yourself. Under the guidance and hopefully supervision of some clever technical friends I will attempt the move myself after this trip.
That brings me back up to date. Packing for this has been a challenge and even I had to give it some thought. Warmer clothes and layers take up more space in a case. Although we have the 23kg allowance each on the flight, I have had to restrict us to medium or small cases to get them all into the car for the journey to the airport. I have never owned thermals before alone had to find room to pack them.
I am not really sure what to expect or anything really but the next adventure awaits.
