Arrgghh!

Choices!
Do I go away and live on my savings and try and gain some experience working either with badgers or collecting rock pool data unpaid for three months?
Or do I continue working in the shop and saving to go away?

Bugger me, what a decision

Oh dear..
Today me and Mum started cleaning out some of the random boxes that have remained unopened since we moved 7 years ago.
We found a box full of video tapes, many unlabelled so we began to view them to see what was worth keeping or not.
Once such tape was our holiday in Florida, when I was 5 and The Brat 3 and there was Dad, young, healthy and laughing and joking towards my Aunt and Uncle who did the filming.
So hard to see that and knowing what was to come and the way it would end up.
Few more memories now to go in that store and now we can hear and remember his voice before it got fucked by the drugs and went harsh and painfilled.

I have been having many, many problems with buses this week, that poxy 178 bus that I have waited over an hour for in freeezing conditions all this week (I'm sure its meant to be every 20 mins?) huddled into a little corner and watching not one, or even two or even three sail past me on the other end of the street to go round the corner at sainsburys only to return smiling smugly at me as a 291 or something equally stupid that I can't get on.
Today I came out of work weighed down with brazil nuts, mango and papaya and something rather imaginatively called breakfast sprinkle (if you think I'm bunging bird seed on my breakfast porridge then you are a fool!)
to find it snowing, after 5 minutes at the bus stop I decided "Fuck this" and rang home for someone to come rescue me, while waiting for our Rust-mobile to show up (complete with no heating) 2 178 buses sailed, mockingly past me and then back round again.
Bah.

So now I'm sitting and thinking about my options, now that I'm free.
Remember when it seemed like I'd never escape here again? And all those long, heart-searching posts about if coming home was the right thing?
I have options now and the most pressing of all is changing my job, don't get me wrong, although its not ideal, I like working in the shop, its a nice place with friendly people, but I genuinely dont care about if I get the sack or fail the exams and whatever, although I go in and work hard and try to learn whatever they go on about.
I'm thinking of trying for a seasonal position with E in the summer working at our local English Heritage site, she worked there last year and made a decent bit of money, its full time, pays better with lots of overtime which pays double.
Alright its not "zoology" but its better than the shop and its easy money.
And then I'm thinking of going away, just like I always planned, go to New Zealand in October and when I come home consider my options then, I've seen a uni course that appeals to me in Marine Biology and I could always try to get on that, or work towards a Masters or even go and look out of London for that Ideal Zoology job.
So I think my main goal now is seeing if there is enough positions for seasonal work when it comes up in a month or too and trying for that, that way it won't matter quitting it in a few months

I woke up feeling so sick today. Its bad enough that I've been battling a cold all week but I totally lost my voice this morning so gave my speech to my uncle G to read - He took it home with him, I'll reprint it here when I get it back.
Anyway, I got up and sat around for a bit, trying to joke with Mum who'd been up since 4am and allready thrown up with nerves.
Then around half eight people started to arrive, my cousin and Nanny and Granddad and then E and her family and then everyone - and people were in suits! Dad didnt want suits! I felt so over dressed in my best jeans and new trainers! Lol!
And then the hearse arrived, and Dad was in the coffin, but like you said Babs it was all so surreal and there was chaos trying to figure out who was getting in who's car and who's cab (Dad being an ex-london Cabbie, Mum wanted us to all go in them rather than funeral cars)
and we ended up with me Nan and Granddad in with us, which threw Mum rather but thats just how our family works - chaos always!
And then we followed the hearse and I couldn't look at it, instead I thought about how we'd sit at the top of Shooters Hill road in the Metro and he'd sing his daft songs.
At the crem, Mum started to get upset and so I linked arms with her and sat on one side and The Brat on the other and he completely broke down at the service and sobbed, where as Mum cried and then sang softly to some of the words to her song.
And my Dad was in that coffin and yet its so strange cos yes I get upset and I have tears prick my eyes (much like now) but I can't let them go, I can't cry and sob like they do and I haven't yet. (Isn't grief a funny thing?)
and (too many "Ands" in this post) then he went and it was hard to connect my Dad to the one in that box and he went behind the curtain and we sang "Always Look On The Bright Side of Life." Just as he had wanted which got some giggles which Dad would have liked.
Only the Bitch Sisters (His - the ones that helped kill Granddad - remember? And robbed him and Great-granddad blind and who Nan is too silly to see otherwise - oh and I have a huge lot of shit to write about that about that last confused, mentally ill month of his life)
commented about how "that wasn't Dad and how it was a daft song to play"
I'm glad I didn't hear it and those that did chose not to act on it or repeat it to Mum until later cos if either of us had heard they'd have got a gobful about how little then actually knew, cared or respected their brother and I'd have twatted them. (In fact I am seriously considering finding out what to do to grass them up for benefit fraud but thats different stories and I'm neither a grass or that petty)
The funeral director (lovely guy) suggested taking a rose out of the only wreath (ours) and drying it as a memento so I plucked the biggest and best one and popped it down my top with only the head showing (Dad would have found that funny - or he'd be attempting that dance [the tango - with the rose in your mouth] with it)
And we went to the pub, Mum and The Brat in control of themselves and we had a great time, Dad would have loved it, all his mates, friends and family (well the ones that actually cared and mattered there) and thats all that matters really, everyone got a chance to say goodbye to him and have a good time as well!

Wheeee! Did you see the Chelski game?! Yayness alround, a draw's pretty presentable and we're nearly top half of the table!

On to serious things now - It's Dad's funeral tomorrow, I said I'd write a speech for it and now I'm remembering my fear of talking in public and I'm struggling to find something worth talking about, I'm thinking of reworking the "I remember" piece I wrote the other day on here.
I hope it all goes alright, It seems unreal that Dad will be in that coffin tomorrow and I'll never see him again, never hear him laugh or joke and I miss him terribly.
I'm frightened too of not being able to deal with this last step.

Saturday's Whaley update.

He died, poor thing, I didn't hold out much hope for him after hearing that he'd beached himself as that's common for sick and dying whales and dolphin type creatures to do.
BTW Spins, The Thames is now one of the cleanest rivers in the country, and Whaley should have been ok living in it for a few days had he been well, although its not ideal and it would have got dehydrated. I wouldnt have held out much hope for something like a fish for every long though!

There is a whale in The Thames!
I missed it but if it turns back round to come downstream I'll be out looking for a picture!

*update* Poor whaley isn't well. There is also reports that there is another at Southend (near the start of the Thames).
Hopefully Whaley can be brought back to its buddy/family member safely and without the other swimming up the Thames to find it

Ok, so more details about Welshy, He's sweet in a kinda not-so-very welsh way.
He's short, not that much taller than me, perhaps 5'5? and very broad chested, he was sweet but there was no attraction there, same as there's been no internet flirting, I think he is just a very good friend the same as my Derby lads are.
Apparently I also spoke to TY'U that night too, not that I remember it and he says he's ok.
Sorry there's no more details to spill, but that's all there is, just a new friend and no romance at all.

So I went to meet Welshy!
He was quite sweet really, and we embarked on an epic drinking trip from 2pm to 11 when Greenwich went dead.
(Bah to this 24 hour drinking thing - and bah to the 386 bus which stops running at midnight!)
which kinda spoiled the end to the night as it was a rush to get to the bus stop and get him back on the DLR.
But it was good and we spent an enjoyable time arguing the merits (of which there is few - in my opinion) and disadvantages of Bryan Hughes (A fucking legend! he proclaimed!)
Anyway this is only short cos I need to zip off to work!

Not only do I have 5 extra hours at work (I'll be rich!) Tomorrow I'm meeting a random Internet Guy.
(Technically does Flash count as a R.I.G?)
Its from the same place as I met the TY'U. (Its a football forum, not a dating site.) and he's welsh, a year older than me, lives in Central London and I've been chatting to him for 5 months now on and off this forum and MSN, I hope it dont go as wrong as the TY'U and end up with a drunken kiss and then me all embarrassed.
I just realised I never filled you guys in on my adventures with TY'U.
He's mysteriously vanished off the face of the Earth! I don't even spot him at Charlton any more!
We spoke since May, nearly every night in some form or other, and then mid-November he just vanished, coming back only once on the forum to defend me when he thought I was getting bullied and to congratulate me on the job, I spoke to him briefly when I let him know Dad had kicked the bucket and that's that.
Tis sad but thats the way life goes I guess.
Oh and not too worry, all the sensible precations are happening incase Welshy turns out to be a balding 45 year old man from Reading.

All the idiots in the world came out today.

I had some woman kick off at me as her hair,skin and nails tonic hadn't worked.
Me: "Uh-huh, so how long have you been taking it?"
Her: "I took the first one yesterday."
Me: "Rrriiiight..."

Later a 14 stone, 18 year old chav bint came in with customary little out of control brat at her feet.
After the little cunt pulled all our flappy shelve display things off, she accosted me.
Her: "I want to see your diet things."
Me: "Ok, here."
Her: "These are no good!"
Me: "Why?"
Her: "Cos you need to be on a diet as well, I want ones that I can just take and carry on eating as normal."
Me: "Erm..."

AND THEN!!! Just before leaving I was called a silly bitch by some woman phoning up and complaining that i'd charged for for 7 items when she'd only brought 5, and somehow expected me to change it all straight away for her, after she'd finished shouting that this was appalling and I was stupid (she didnt even know that it was me who served her, or who I was) and then I finally got through to her that I couldnt do anything till she came down she said that she didnt want me to serve her on the till!
When it may not have even been me in the first place!

I know!
I've been such a bad blogger this week!
I've just not been in the mood to do it at all, I'm sorry.

So Monday was Dad's birthday and Mum wanted to go out for a meal to celebrate, so we hit the motorway (not her favourite place in the world) only for her to get jelly legs after a little while so we ended up in Bluewater eating KFC! Somehow I think Dad'd have found that funny, or he'd have moaned at our lack of adventureness!
Tuesday was a bit of a tough day, we went and organised a funeral, its booked for the 23rd (ages away! who'd have believed that a crematorium would be fully booked?)
It's gonna be fun, we're gonna have a huge party afterwards too in a pub near to where Mum works and there's gonna be over 50 of us there.
We organised songs too, Mum wants us to come into Endless Love which is "their" song apparently, and then First Time I Ever Saw Your Face, as she says the first time she saw my Dad falling out of a pub was the minute she knew he was the one for her.
And on a brighter note to cheer up that depressing and soppy lot we have one of my Dad's most favouritest songs ever to go down to.
Always Look on The Bright Side Of Life, which IS Dad.
And that's that, No flowers, only donations to the places and charities that have helped us, the volunteer drivers from the local hospital, Macmillian Nurses, and the Hospice.

And that's that. I've been overwhelmed by the cards and phonecalls that have come and your kind messages.
Thank you all.

Happy Birthday Daddy - Where ever you are!

I remember.

I remember endless games of silly buggers, spinning our trolley around in the supermarkets, play-fights and the faces that he pulled that so annoyed me cos it made me giggle no matter how annoyed I was.
I remember calling over his routes with him while he was learning the knowledge.
I remember him picking me up from uni while I filled him in on our latest adventures.
I remember weekends spent in the pub, and him coming home drunk once and watching us spin round in the garden and deciding to have a go while carrying our tea and falling over.
I remember coming home to see him with pink hair after an adventure with hair dye went wrong.
I remember evenings and days full of endless board games and being taught chess and draughts and then showing him how to play Spider Solitaire on the computer.
I remember watching Mary Poppins and Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang with him.
I remember how we used to prefer him taking us to school cos we’d get a fry-up instead of cereal.I remember him driving us to school, trying to annoy us by singing his dodgey old songs in funny accents.
I remember how he helped install a love of animals and nature, when he’d point out the different birds to me and how we’d watch them in the garden.
I remember looking over the fish with him, and helping to clean them out.
I remember helping him with our budgie that we had when we were very little.
I remember always enviously looking at ponds.
I remember him leading us with on the ponies.
I remember standing up by the kitchen door one night watching a lunar eclipse.
I remember him taking us on trips to the stables and standing there watching us.
I remember his childish excitement at Christmas and Birthdays and Easters.
I remember watching football either live or on the telly and discussing the latest results and their chances for the next couple of games.
I remember hearing his cab pull into our street and the rattling as it stopped, different to every other cab in the street.
I remember his pleasure in seeing me at uni and seeing me graduate.

And I remember the pain of the illness, when he’d nearly be in tears.
I remember the hallucinations.
I remember the stumbling.
I remember the losing of all pride and dignity.
I remember the operations and medications.
I remember the missing of breaths.
I remember the visiting of countless doctors and nurses.
I remember him trying to talk but not having the ability.
I remember him being scared.
I remember stroking your hair and everyone’s heartbreak.

I will remember.

I'm sorry to report that Dad died today at 3.30 in the afternoon.
It was very sudden and very peaceful.

We were called in at 7.20am after being told that he had worsened, He spent a great portion of the morning in a half-waking-half-sleeping state, he knew that we were there as he grew a bit more animated occasionally when hearing our voices and when we put Mary Poppins - his favourite film on for him.
Later they popped a catheter and a pump-drip type thing on him to give him a little morphine, and he went to sleep and there he pretty much stayed until the end.
When the end came he was with my Mum, the Minster we want to take the service and the builder who built the loft, Mum noticed that his breathing was growing erratic, but he'd been skipping the odd breath since we took him in and called the doc who said that he was going, by the time the nurse and builder and minster had walked down the short corridor to get me he had gone.
I sat with Mum and stroked his hair for a little while and said my goodbyes and we waited for my brother to come (he's decided to go to work for 3pm)
He's at peace now, and like I said, he knew we were about and he wasn't alone and he wasn't in any pain or scared any more.
















Dad in November at OF's fireworks party.

9/1/59 - 6/1/06

RIP.

After another awful night Dad has been taken into the hospice. I doubt he'll be coming out again.
Obviously I'll be taking a break from all this blogging and internetty marlarky for a while.
I'll try and keep you guys updated though if I get a chance but I don't think it'll be long now.

So here's a highlight of last night's adventures and a recap of my day so far!

Went to bed in the parents room as requested at 11pm.
11.10 discover that the bed is hard.
12.20. discover that its too hot too sleep up there, so find a fleece to sleep in.
12.35. come to the conclusion that the reason I've not slept yet is because Dad snores too loud, stare at ceiling.
2am. Spent an hour listening to Dad telling us about how he needed trousers for his report but the man kept stealing the too tight ones and he needed a fiver and didnt have a fiver but then some nice man lent him a tenner and now I had to help him write a 999 line report on his trousers, Mum finally gets him back to sleep.
4am. Woken if that's the right word when you've not slept by him telling us he was in the deep end of the pool and was drowning, Mum talked him out of getting his brother and got him up and put Mary Poppins on for him.
5am - He asks for a cup of tea, takes the opportunity of Mum being away to demand that I let him call his brother or our friend down the street, I refuse and he grabs my pj tshirt and threatens to kick my head in, which is funny when you consider that he cant even hold the tv remote so dunno what he thought he was gonna do.
by 6am, Mum had calmed him back down and he decided he was going to have a shower.
I disappear downstairs to my room and curl up and try to sleep.
7am, woken by The Brat getting up and ready to work - He slept through this, I hate him!
9.10am, arrive at work.
Work till 4pm, get home by 4.20, listen to the last of the football.
5.11pm. sleep!
7pm woken by Dad going to bed, he asks me to keep him company so I do so, and I listen while he tells me about how he's been on the roof (clearly some attic-building flashback there) and then that Mum's reported him disappeared (in his own words) and how he needed to ring the police station to let them know that he wasn't disappeared. (I think this was due to the bit in Mary Poppins where the Dad goes to report the kids missing and then the policeman brings them back as thats what we were watching at the time).
He asks me to pause the DVD, and then the telly, which puzzled over when he insisted I could, merely put it on standby, he then got quite excited about my electronic-pausing activities and asked me to put the radio on and pause that.
Phew! I'm knackered and have much respect for My Mum who puts up with this night after night.

The descent into madness here continues where it left off in the Last Year.
Dad working on the theory that being awake means you won't die has renounced sleep, unfortunately this means everyone else around him needs to be awake.
Poor Mum!
He stayed awake all night and then at half 7 decided that he didnt want to be in bed any more and somehow managed to ring his brother to come and get him (bearing in mind that the guy can scarcely lift a teaspoon)
He then demanded to be picked up now so he could go see Nan and wish her happy New Year.
So off he toddled with me and Mum wondering if he'd come back in the same bad mood he did on Xmas day.
When he came back, he was silent for a few minutes before bursting into tears.
When questioned on what was wrong he declaired dramatically.
"Its you! You're gonna hit and hurt me cos I keep getting you up!"
Naturally Mother was rather puzzled by this sudden outburst and gradually coaxed him up the stairs for a sleep on my bed, which he did for two hours or so.
When he woke The Brat tried to help him down the stairs, but his legs gave way and luckily The Brat caught him.
He also decided that I needed to sleep in the same room as them tonight "Cos she wont hurt me if you're about."
What could I do but agree?
Later on that day I was upstairs with The Brat and Mum was cooking tea when we heard a crash and then Mum Screaming for The Brat.
Some how he'd managed to get up and go into the backroom before collapsing.
Mum, being the person who is trying to get him to sleep reasonably and to not hassle unsuspecting people at random times of the night is now his most hated enemy, and I am his most favourite person in the entire world.
He kept trying to get me to either take him out in the wheelchair (which I wasn't doing on account of tipping him out) or upstairs so he could bitch about Mother in private.
Its amusing me and it was quite cute to see him tap the side of the settee next to me and give me a pleading look so Mum wouldn't sit next to him!
I managed to talk him into playing a simple game with me where his mind kept wandering off into flights of fantasy.
"where's Wammie?!" He demanded suddenly.
"Huh?"
"Wammie!" He said impatiently. "Wammie! (his brother's Staff terrier)"
"He aint here." I pointed out.
"I know that, but where is he?"
"At your brothers house?"
"Huh."
I've just been up there now to clear the super-smart hospital bed so I can sleep on it and he turned to me.
"I'm scared."
"Of what?"
"Her!"
"Well that's why I'm staying here, I gotta get up early for work tomorrow, so you better sleep."
Ooops!
He turned on Mum now.
"Thats why you want her here! So you can tell me to be quiet cos of [insert real name] just so you can sleep!"
I left her too it and ran away.
The poor fuckers really scared, not only of her, but of his suddenly untrustworthy legs and the inevitable which is looking very close at the moment and he must see that too.