I apologise to my friends in the UK for not getting in touch but I shall make up for it in July.
It's been a funny few weeks as in funny peculiar rather than hilarious. The lead up was pleasantly spent booking flights and a hire car around Darwin where we are meeting up with Ian from Budapest. This is ostensibly a birding trip but there will be lots of other activities going on like blowing the froth of a coldie and burning steaks on an open fire for the carnivores and tofu burgers for the others.
Then, and I suppose I had been expecting it, came the news that my mother had taken parachute lessons and was practicing on the stairs sans parachute. So it was off to the UK post haste. Imagine my surprise when I was told that despite a fractured pelvis and that she was home alone she was shoved out on a cold and frosty night. Luckily the grandchildren were in attendance and they managed to get her to Peterborough where the daughter in law and the rest of the family live. I cannot imagine the discomfort of a two hour drive with a fractured bit was but I bet it wasn't fun for any of them.
So mum was delivered back home and I looked after her for a few weeks and organised home help and food to be delivered so I could get back home.
So I had been home for a couple of weeks when I got the news that she had been taken to hospital again with breathing difficulties. To cut a long story short she was in hospital until we could organise a place where she would be looked after. The workings of Social Services would be a joy to behold if you weren't involved with them. If you are then it's like rounding up cats. It seems that if you move authorities there is no infrastructure to cope with such a bizarre situation. Again after many frustrating fairy steps we arrived at a giant leap forward for geriatrickind we found a place in a sheltered housing place. I have heard that she is settling in though is a little confused, I shall be back in July.
On the bird front I just cannot believe the number of Red Kites you can count from a hospital ward, 20 in one whirling flock. I haven't been out and about recently but a pair of Black Kites just outside Ballarat was the best I can offer. Now that winter is biting I shall endeavor to make the most of sunny times and get out and play with the new camera. So I apologise once again for the monologue on my mother but I had to get some of it of my chest.
Sorry no photos in this one but I will make up for it, promise.