Last January I wrote about the changes in my life since the previous year, today I’m doing the same.

I’m still a bit ditsy, still enjoying a drop of vino, still got the aches and pains. James is still living at home, Claire still pops round most days. The ex is still an arsehole, though he’s not bothered me so much lately. I still live in a zoo. Bert is our latest addition, he’s a bearded dragon and quite a funny character.

I went abroad for the first time, which was great. I had a lovely time.

Last January I said how I was 6 months into a relationship and how it was going well and that I’d probably jinxed it by saying that. Well guess what? Yep, it’s over. It was my decision and I don’t regret it. There was something missing and I wasn’t prepared to just settle. I’d had doubts for quite a while before I finished it. Before we went on holiday I thought if I still had doubts on our return I’d have a talk with him. Then events took over and he was rushed to hospital for open heart surgery 2 days after we came home. So obviously that wasn’t the right time!

That paled into insignificance though. The worst time of my life was to follow… my lovely mum was diagnosed with cancer. The hospital weren’t very professional in their handling of it which made coming to terms with the news even harder.

My beautiful mum passed away on September 28th.  She died at home. It was a beautiful sunny day and all 5 of us were at her bedside.

Since then life has been empty, she was so vibrant and  full of life. She was also such a good friend. I miss her dearly.

In a nutshell that was my year. Some things stay the same, others will never be the same again. So goodbye 2011…you were shit!

Hello 2012, what have you got to throw at me this year?

Over the years I’ve tried in vain to track down one of my oldest and dearest friends, Jenny. Imagine my surprise and delight when she made contact through Facebook a couple of weeks ago. It made my day to hear from her and since then we’ve swapped several emails and chatted on the phone. The years have just slipped away and we’re back being silly giggly schoolgirls again. I hate talking to people on the phone unless I know them really well, but when we spoke there were no awkward silences we just gabbled away for well over an hour. I’d forgotten what her voice was like but as soon as she spoke I recognised it and her laugh is exactly the same after more than thirty years.

 Long forgotten memories came flooding back. I didn’t know she was bullied at school and she didn’t know I was. We never talked about it then, nor about how unhappy we were at school or how we couldn’t wait to leave. We laughed about the time we smuggled cider into school and downed it behind the music block….. About our maths teacher who really couldn’t cope with the pressure…. About all manner of silly things.

We found ourselves telling each other our problems and  laughing over how dozy we still are (both going the wrong way round the M25 for example).

We’re now looking forward to meeting up in the flesh and catching up on all the lost years.

Years ago without the aid of the internet once you lost contact with someone it was so much harder to trace people and that’s quite sad really. Sometimes technology isn’t so bad

Someone asked me the other day if we had any plans to move in together and I replied that I hadn’t given it any thought but after nearly seven years on my own I think I’d find it really hard to adapt. I eat when I want, sleep when I want, do what I want without having to consider anyone else. I think it would be quite hard to move in with someone, especially as both having been married we have our own ideas and ways of doing things.

So much as I’m looking forward to this holiday it’s also going to be a test of whether we can put up with each other for any length of time

A) That I’m female    and   

 B) That I’m annoyed because of hormones. 

I am in fact annoyed by the way people assume things and make their minds up on people without knowing them. Just by their name, their look or what they write.

So there I was minding my own business reading someone’s blog. (Well I guess that’s an oxymoron because if I was reading someone’s blog it was THEIR business I was minding not mine!) The said person had written a very tongue-in-cheek post to which I wrote an equally tongue-in-cheek reply. Suddenly I was pounced on by someone who hadn’t realised I was joking and picking up on my blogging name replied with “Oh you can see how you got your name you’re so stupid EVERYTHING  has to be explained to you”.  I was rather taken aback as I’ve never spoken to this woman. I’ve never even seen her name on any other site. It was my first comment on a new blog (not hers) and it seemed such a strong ,venomous reply to a totally innocent comment written in a jokey way. I asked if i’d missed something, being from across the pond and all that. I was met with another scathing comment. So with that I replied “I forgot our British humour doesn’t always translate well across the ocean but I hope you can forgive me as I’ve forgiven your rudeness and presumptiousness about my post and name .” She’s gone very quiet now………..silly tart!

People that know me will realise I use the name Dopeydee in a mocking way as I am in fact highly intelligent and superior. Before anyone comments on my bigheadedness…….yes I am joking! I know how to laugh at myself and am very self- deprecating. It does annoy me when people just assume I’m thick because of it without getting to know me. I guess that’s my fault for using such a name.  I don’t mind when people I know use it in that way and laugh at my moments of doziness, I enjoy the banter and will return it at any opportunity but when a complete stranger does it in such a rude way that’s another matter.

Also on the same subject is when people judge others by the way they look or the clothes they wear without getting to know them. I must admit I’ve been guilty of that myself on occasion.

But why do we do it? Until we get to know someone we should never presume that we know anything about them or their lives.

Anyway I digress, that isn’t what this post is about. When my little girl ,Louise, died, we had genetic counselling. After a few months we were told there was no reason for her problems it was just “One of those things”.  Those four words have always been deeply hurtful to me. It’s such a throwaway statement. I flicked onto Eastenders for the first time in a couple of weeks the other day only to hear Kat being told the same thing, her baby’s cot death was “one of those things”. I must say I had to switch off quickly.

I’m sorry but to me burning your dinner is “One of those things”. Losing your keys is “One of those things”.

The death of a baby is NOT  and never should be trivialized in such a way with such a glib comment.

I’m sorry I was away for so long. I hope you enjoyed the peace because I’m back now!

Well looking back it’s just over a year since I first started blogging. Saying that, it has been nearly 5 months since my last post though. I don’t know why I stopped really. Other things took over, an addiction to a stupid game for one. Boredom with Twitter another. Real life got in the way a bit too I guess. Plus a mental blockage of what drivel to write about didn’t help. But I’m back to my rambling, ranting state so the wise thing for you all to do is run away!

Looking back over the year at first I thought well nothing much has changed since last year and in some ways it hasn’t. My ex is still an arsehole, my kids still use the place as a hotel, my body is still crumbling away, I’m still overweight …oh and I still like the vino collapso.

But in other ways there have been many changes. I have a car again after nearly a year without one…yay! Although I’m still overweight I have lost a stone and a half, or at least I had until Christmas, I haven’t weighed myself since so it’s probably all gone back on. I met up with my lovely twitter friend Jan (@oxbow11) and her hubby. I’m a bit more confident then I was (although still suffering the middle-aged angst) and I’m with a lovely fella. Six months on and it’s going really well……….there you go! That’s jinxed that. Oh yes I am still a pessimist, that hasn’t changed.

You can expect a barrage of posts over the next few weeks now I’m back in the swing of it as I’ve several things whirring through my otherwise empty head. What’s that you say? “Oh joy”? Haha you have been warned

Now that I’m 39 recurring *cough cough* it’s a different matter though. After being married for far too many years and starting the dating game again, I seem to suffer from all those insecurities.  “He hasn’t rang/ text…why hasn’t he rang/text?”  “ Ohh dear did I really say that to him?”   “ I shouldn’t of said/done that”   “Omg look at the love handles/muffin top! How can I hide them?”   “ Where’s the good bra that hoists my boobs up from my knees so they look all young and perky again?” Then of course there’s the Bridget Jones dilemma……big knickers to hold everything in or little sexy crack crawlers in case things progress?

The list is endless, maybe I should just curl up in my rocking chair with my knitting and a cup of cocoa?

Any of you familiar with Facebook will know they tend to have a lot of games going on. It always bugged me how much room they’d take up in the “news feed”. I wasn’t interested in how many animals you’ve got, what bricks or tools you needed or if your crops lived or died. I couldn’t get the fascination with them or understand why people took them so seriously …….until now.

A week or two ago a friend of mine asked if I’d join one of these stupid games. he assured me I wouldn’t have to do anything, just sign up so he could get extra points each day by “visiting” me. I was reluctant at first but he insisted I wouldn’t need to play along. So I joined. Then I was a bit bored one night so decided to “have a look” and well the rest as they say is history. I am now well and truly hooked, I just hadn’t realised how much until last night when I went to bed. As I was trying to go to sleep I started thinking about how I wanted my “homestead” to look. Then I woke up around 3am to get a drink and went to switch on the pc “just to have a quick go” Luckily I came to my senses…..3am??? Stupid woman.

So Paul if you read this I’d like to thank you from the heart of my bottom and ask you never, ever to ask me to do anything like that again.

For those of you not already hooked, don’t be tempted to see what they’re about. They’re far too time-consuming.

Right now that’s out of my system I’d better go and harvest my wheat.

But what a night it was! It was worth the feet swelling up like balloons and being painful for three days after. It was worth the bad back from standing and dancing so long.

On Tuesday I went to see The Osmonds, Bay City Rollers, Leo Sayer and David Essex all one bill. I was in Heaven! I’ve seen the Osmonds many times before and had seen David Essex once but not the others. It was fantastic, there was a real party atmosphere from beginning to end. They may all be oldies but they know how to put on a show. The whole audience were on their feet from the very beginning having a ball.

We were slightly alarmed when at the end of David Essex’s set there was a strong smell of burning and smoke. But I had no intention of leaving until I’d seen The Osmonds, they are my favourites and the ones I’d gone to see most of all and were the only ones who hadn’t yet performed. I said I would stay exactly where I was until I’d seen them even if they emptied the arena! A security guard informed us whatever it was, it was all under control anyway so the show went on. It was about 1.30am before we finally got home and though I was shattered I couldn’t sleep because of the pain I was in.

Will it stop me doing it all over again? Hell no!! I tried to get tickets for last night but they’d sold out. Ah well, there’s always another one on somewhere.