Julie

This is posted with much love and affection for Julie.

She was my neighbour for 21 years. She was the cool kid next door, always in and out of our house. My parents loved her to bits and called her the 'little star'. In a reciprocal arrangement, her Mum was my 'auntie Babs' and much better value than the blood aunties.

Later she became the more clued-up big sister. My own sister is 14 years older than me, and read Cosmopolitan, so I 'borrowed' it from age 7. Julie, only 5 years older and not as unapproachable as big sis, explained the bits that 'Jackie' magazine wouldn't tackle!

In another life her ability to create a party out of nothing, and get it talked about for weeks would have earned her megabucks. And I learned a lot about how a pithy one-liner can start or end a fight, from Julie. She was fundamentally a kind, funny person who did light up a room. Few people can really do that.

After we moved my mum would go on regular jaunts to the old neighbourhood and still saw Julie quite often. She only remarked a fortnight ago that it was strange that Julie had been out when she called.

She died of aggressive lung cancer on Tuesday 17 June, after 5 weeks of negative tests for pneumonia at a nearby hospital. Paul hadn't told us she was ill; it was supposed to be routine checks for pneumonia and pleurisy, he saw no reason to alarm an old lady for nothing. Julie would be home soon. It ended in a frantic attempt at chemotherapy at Wythenshawe Neil Cliffe Centre.

She was 49, planning a big 50th do, and looking forward to her 16 year-old son starting college in September.

In her lifetime she managed to own a damn fine collection of Pesky Critters, though it would be unfair to count partner Paul and sons Lee and Matthew amongst them. Let's have a bit of respect for the living.

Insert your own 'sudden death platitude' here. All I can think is 'oh bugger, it won't be the same without Jules'.

Tyler update

Can now walk, and brush his own hair! Better than most of the adults I know...

Six unaided steps on Friday, then he sat down and applauded, just in case we missed the point.

Saturday, he took his mum's hairbrush and wobbled over to the mirror to sort his own hair out. And he doesn't mind having his teeth brushed, all nine of them.

All at 10 months, 3 weeks and 2 days. I've no idea whether this is good progress or not, so I'm just going to be stupidly proud and vaguely pompous about it all.

Starting with an apology...

apparently it is Lowden, but I'm not blessed with innate musicality, so I didn't know. But the aggrieved Lowden owner suggested 'Compton Mackenzie' as a name for the new Macbook, and I think it works.

The cats have shown an indecent amount of interest in the new toy. So I think their kind concern should be added to the mix.

Welcome, Compton Mac-kenzie, Reservoir Macbook. Shame I bought the white one.

Sign the Petition - Support Your Surgery

I received this link at work, regarding the BMA 'Support Your Surgery' Campaign.

And this is why it is important.

"Suicide GP 'frustrated' at work"

She was a GP in my practice. A few months ago I noticed a sign saying she was unwell and her cases would be dealt with by Dr Hoeffman. To be honest, the last time I was in, I didn't notice they had taken the notice down. There had been no announcement in the Surgery, though this may have been out of respect for the family, knowing the inquest was still due.

She was a great GP, and we'll miss her. But the fact is, when it was run as a surgery with medical secretaries doing the paperwork, it ran brilliantly. But in the past few years, local surgeries have been told to operate as mini-polyclinics, and the medical staff have been forced to do more business based work. And they don't want to be administrators, they want to be GPs.

I need a name for the Macbook

My knackered old pc has finally corked it. It can just about function for e-mail and everything else can go whistle.

Add that to a tasty discount from Apple because I have an ac.uk email address at work, and what do you get?

Me, down the Apple store, buying my first Mac.

I intend to keep it as the ONLY Mac, but the sales staff gave me the 'humour the lunatic' smile. They know I've left the Dark Side of Microshite, I will be back buying stuff and gubbins in no time.

I didn't ask Scott because I suspect he would lead me into the same amount of damage as the Guitar Buying Incident at Cambridge Folk Festival(2002, 2003?).

If I get as much enjoyment from this Mac as Scott does from Dani (the beautiful Lowdon guitar), it will be a bargain. And it's easier to carry round.

Dog fighting in suburbia

There has been a lot of news recently, about open forms of dogfighting.

So guess who decided to join in with the craze on Wednesday morning? Name starts with a G, ends with -romit, that's who.

His violent and unprovoked attack, on poor Blake, took everyone by surprise. Blake recovered well, and retaliated by getting his nose under Gromit's midriff and flipping him into the air. Accompanied by savage growls and yapping, it all sounded far more horrible and sinister than it was.

Gromit, as any beaten bully should, slunk off home in disgrace, and is now banned from the walking circuit until he learns to behave. His pride is hurt, but everywhere else is fine.

But I bet the authors of all the news stories did not think the craze had spread to sweet old ladies and lapdogs! And not a hood in sight, either :)

A conversation with Tyler

We looked after Tyler on Sunday.

While trying to shovel some healthy baby-mush into him, he became fascinated with Tiger. The feeling was mutual, as the baby-mush smelt like a tempting alternative to cat food.

I pointed at Tiger, and said, "Cat."
"Cat!"
"Ginger cat."
"Gerrr cat!"

Not bad, I thought.

So I pointed at Bailey.

"Dog."
"Dat!"

Early days...