Saturday, November 02, 2019

Stuff Done

The past week has seemed filled with "stuff to do" that was not sufficiently interesting to write about at length: follow-up appointment with radiologist (skin all healed well after radiation treatments in August). Dentist appointment for a filling. Appointment for a CT scan to discover whether any changes have taken place for good or ill during past 6 months. Haven't had result yet. Letters and numerous garbled phone calls about my grant towards cost of Ibrance medication running out. Efforts made to obtain a fresh grant. Finding a way to fax our last tax return in relation to the grant issue. Having faxed it, more garbled phone calls in relation to same. I say "garbled" because most of the time I cannot understand what the person at the other end of the line is saying. They are usually carrying out lists of routine contacts, gabbling their lines at top speed. I thought that it was an accent problem, but no, my husband has the same difficulty. Nobody is taught how to speak on the phone, in a professional way, these days - or if they are, the lessons are soon forgotten!

Then it was Hallowe'en.

We had only two trick or treaters this year, one of whom was my husband's great-granddaughter, Serenity, with her grandparents. It seems that the old-fashioned Hallowe'en customs have, at last, been overtaken by more communal and organised dress-up occasions care of churches, schools or other societies. It was an unusually cold evening here too, which didn't entice young visitors travelling on foot. Here is great-granddaughter Serenity, with husband and I - he got all dressed up for the occasion too. :)

8 comments:

  1. Yes, I get really confused trying to figure out what these people are saying on the phone too. It's routine for them, first time for us.

    And I too lament the loss of an old tradition, the Trick or Treat trek. But, that's progress, I guess; sometimes it's good, sometimes it's bad.

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  2. You look marvelous! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXydX9p_ZxA

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  3. I go back to my childhood days with Halloween being so different and always indoors with games and apple bobbing and the barm brack and ghost stories. In the Irish tradition it was said that the veil between the living and the dead was never thinnest than at Halloween, All Hallow's Eve. So we avoided graveyards or dared each other to lie on a grave and listen.

    GGdaughter is a beautiful child and you look marvellous T. You'd never know you were run through the mill in the past while.

    XO
    WWW

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  4. Yes, you are looking very well, which is more than can be said for 'Him Indoors' in that outfit! Still, kudos for having the courage to wear it :-)
    Maybe it's maturity (okay, I'm getting old!) but I have to agree about these so-called professional people on the telephone. Of course, we have the language difficulty over here in France, where it's difficult to comprehend what they say when they're talking directly at you, but by phone it's almost impossible, they jabber so fast. I ask them to speak slowly and they say 'okay' then go off at the same speed as before. By far the worst is the digital French - the dreaded AI 'digital voice'. I give up as soon as I hear one of those. Even tried 'Google voice' to translate, but it packs in after the first word, and usually gets THAT wrong.
    Oh, well, now I'm old I'm entitled to say, "It's not like it was in the good old days."

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  5. anyjazz ~ Answering the phone has become something I dread. Face to face it's easier to ask for repetition, or slower pace, with a smile to show that I'm not trying to be awkward.

    Hallowe'en wasn't celebrated much at all when I was young in England, even during the last years I lived there the trick or treat thing hadn't fully caught on. I miss "Bonfire Night" though - fifth November - Guy Fawkes an' all that :)

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  6. Anonymous ~ Thank you - you are too kind!

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  7. Wisewebwoman ~ I think that in Ireland more was made of Hallowe'en season than in England - that's probably how the tradition arrived, and survived, here in the USA, with the many immigrants from Eire.

    Thank you on behalf of Serenity, WWW. She has a sweet nature, too, to match her looks. Thank you too for your kind words about yours truly. :)

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  8. RJ Adams ~ Thank you kindly RJ! Oh yes, I can imagine how difficult it must be for you in France, phone-wise. Robot calls, here, drive us nuts too. "Back in the day" (as they say) the phone might ring, for the average couple or family, just a few times a week - if they even owned a phone that is, and many people didn't. Now, it appears to me that many people live on the flippin' phone! You'd expect, that being so, that they'd get better at it!

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