Day off on Friday; I spent the morning running various messages round and about Basinghole. Had some equipment to deliver to the SJA building (two visits, as the door code I was originally given was wrong); visited John Lewis (where I didn’t buy anything), Waitrose (where I spent the obligatory £10 to get my parking fee refunded – beer, so not a wasted purchase (Old Hooky so still less a wasted purchase)); Lidl (where I successfully negotiated the self-checkout without a hissy fit from the machine); Halfords (for wiper blades), and the fam shop (for one two of their wonderful pies). I also used my swipe-and-pay card for the first time ever – on the parking machine because I didn’t have cash.

Windscreen wiper blades are a hassle to buy. There are umpteen different types of blade available. Seems like every vehicle has a specific blade. So first I look at the reference guide to find which type I need. Then hunt through the rack for them. The pair I selected seemed very long (and expensive). Surely my windscreen isn’t that large. I was right, it isn’t. I’d looked up the wrong car model on the reference guide.

I also had to buy some oil – the dashboard was telling me the engine oil was low. Have you ever tried to find out which type of oil your engine needs? Good luck with that. The owner manual tells you how to check the level and how to top it up, but not what type. You need to leaf through the service manual, and then know what type of engine you have. Or just buy any carton and hope for the best.

The perils of weekday shopping hit me at the checkout in the farm shop when I was stuck behind an elderly lady who had forgotten her glasses and was having difficulty in seeing the buttons on the credit card PIN machine. After she hit the incorrect buttons three times, the store opened up another till and I was able to complete my purchases while she was still trying to pay for hers.

CS3 got her own back on me for the wind-ups over that last few weeks:
“Ruby, will you help me with my homework this weekend?”
“I expect so – what subject is it”
“Art”
“You are having a laugh!!”

I had – still have – a painful mouth ulcer last week, from biting my lip while eating. I had some bonjela so put that on it. As I squeezed it out I thought it looked a bit darker than usual, and had a thicker texture - more like the rubber solution you use on bicycle punctures. Looking initially to see whether it had a “use within three months of opening” warning (I’ve had it for a while) I found the “use by” date. Er, August. In 2014. I’ve definitely had it for a while.

Saturday afternoon I was providing first aid cover at a model railway exhibition. It was a very male-dominated event – and several of the males looked as if they would have problems functioning in normal society. Though some of the layouts were quite impressive, with buildings, landscaping and ancillary modelling.

I am quite equivocal about model railways. The child in me says “yeah a train set; let’s play with it”. The pedant in me understands that if you are trying to model a certain area and/or time period, the trains should represent the typical traffic. You can’t have a GWR train running where a GWR train never ran. I’m not sure whether I would go as far as insisting the model trains run according to the original timetable though.

But the people were friendly enough. I had a pleasant chat with a couple of people in the coffee area, mainly about the sixth-form college where the exhibition was held. It’s the college that CS1 and CS2 attend, so I know a little about it. Another guy was sitting on a chair in the corridor and called me over. He didn’t look particular healthy, so I was a bit concerned he needed our services. Quick chat established that although he wasn’t in the Mae West of health generally, he was feeling normal for him. He said he’d come to Eastleigh by train and walked from the station – a distance of about 1 ¼ miles. I tactfully suggested that he might want to consider a taxi for getting back.

Delivering training on Sunday morning. Originally I was just doing a 1 hour stint, but the other trainer was injured so asked if I could cover the rest of the morning.

One of the topics was Manual Handling, and we got onto the bit about the attributes of a person that can make them better or worse for carrying stuff bout. “Gender” came a suggestion from one trainee. This was a good suggestion (and one that is not often made) as there is indeed a difference between men and women – basically men are more dense. But she then went on to explain her reasoning: “because if a woman has big breasts she will find it difficult to carry the object”. As I gave out the Haribo reward I explained that this was for recognising there is difference between men and women wrt manual handling, not for mentioning big breasts.