“May you live in interesting times” is a double-edged Chinese saying. Last week lived up to that, with no heating here at Tottering Towers and too much water surrounding DD’s house in Tewkesbury. It’s been all go again here this week, although mostly in a good way.
On Monday, I typed ‘The End’ on my latest Pocket Novel and submitted it.
On Tuesday, I was given three more exercises by the physio for the soft tissue injury to my hip. As soon as I can walk at a gradient without pain on the treadmill, I can start running again. Yay! I think…
On Wednesday, after a sleepless night of worry, I had Nessie the permanent cast removed from my wrist. The process was nothing like as bad as I thought it would be. Watching videos of casts being removed from uninjured volunteers turned out to be a very bad idea. Their limbs were being twisted around in a way I knew would have me passing out with the pain!
I needn’t have worried. When you have a real injury under that plaster exoskeleton and it’s not just for show, the medical staff go out of their way to avoid causing pain.
Still, I was disappointed not to get a sticker saying I’ve been brave at the hospital!
On Thursday and Friday I settled down with my Work in Progress, Kitten Cupid. I’m not getting much done. Every couple of hours I have to stop and do a session of physiotherapy, either on my wrist, or on my hip!
I’ll be sending out my first newsletter of 2024 next week. It will include an extract from my next release, Royal Risk, an update on my other writing projects, and more. Sign up for my newsletter here and I’ll send you a copy of Royal Rivals, a collection of short stories about the heroes and heroines of my Royal Romances series before their lives became entwined…
2024 isn’t even a week old, but we’ve had plenty of drama and excitement here in darkest Gloucestershire already. First we froze, then there was a flood…
The Heater Rebels
Living in the middle of a wood, we’re used to the electricity supply failing pretty regularly. Squirrels often gnaw through the wires, or falling branches bring down the power lines. What we didn’t expect was for our central heating and hot water system to grind to a halt within months of getting a new boiler. For two days and nights we had no heating, and no hot water unless we boiled a kettle.
A Chilly Crisis
On Wednesday morning, (3rd January) the heater began burbling and banging. Its onboard computer reported there was “no flame detected on ignition”. We reported the fault, but the gas company couldn’t send an engineer out for a couple of days. In trying to do our bit for the environment, we had our solid fuel system taken out a few years ago. What a mistake that was! Tottering Towers is an old, cold house. Although we’ve added lots of insulation and draught-proofing, the temperature dropped like a stone. By Wednesday night the temperature in the coldest room in the house barely reached 54 degrees Fahrenheit (12 degrees Celsius).
We always keep lots of fresh, frozen, and dried food in stock in case we’re snowed in. There are boxes of batteries and candles, too, for those times when the lights go out. The only thing we didn’t have was any form of non-electrical heating. We had our solid fuel system replaced with gas central heating and an electric cooker several years ago. After this brush with hypothermia, we’ve decided that relying on a single form of power isn’t worth the risk. We’re going to invest in a log burner!
Elli’s Flood Ordeal
We were chilly, but our daughter Elli was facing something far more frightening.
Elli lives in the small country town of Tewkesbury. Her tiny cottage is more than four hundred years old. It’s all old oak beams and handmade bricks, and I don’t think there’s a right angle or any parallel surface in the place! On one side, her home is so close to ancient Tewkesbury Abbey, a decent bowler or pitcher could make a ball rattle the Abbey’s bells. In the other direction , the River Avon flows past, only yards from her front door.
Over the past few months England has had a lot of rain. Low-lying Tewksbury lies between the Malvern Hills and the Cotswolds, so water drains into the river from a lot of high ground. Storm Henke hit Gloucestershire on January 2nd. The Avon had already crept out of its bed, and by Wednesday 3rd January had covered the riverside walk beside Elli’s house. The monks who built Tewkesbury Abbey knew what they were doing. That building is on high ground, so it never floods. The houses built in its shadow are slightly lower. Water often rises to within a foot or so of these houses, but they rarely flood. The last time was in 2007. This week, though, the water rose so high and so fast that my husband Martyn drove through the night to go and give Elli some moral support.
He reached her house at 1am on Thursday morning. She has a flood gate which should stop the river actually getting in to the house, but who wants to put something like that to the test?
Elli’s Challenge
Next morning, Elli had to wade through a foot of flood water to reach her car, which she had parked on higher ground the previous day. She drove to work through many patches of surface water. During the day, those patches joined up to make such widespread flooding that she and her workmates were sent home at 3pm “while you can still get there”.
She had to take all sorts of detours as many roads were closed. At one point she thought she would have to come here and stay the night. Martyn was marooned in Tewkesbury, as almost all the roads in and out of the town were impassable. Eventually she got home to find the flood water level with her doorstep (see photo).
The rain stopped, but the river went on rising through the night. Martyn took the photo of Elli’s front door a few hours before the one of the flood height measure (below). At its peak the floodwater lapped close to the bottom of the blue floodgate, but not a drop got into the house. The photo taken during the night shows how deep the floodwater was around the Abbey Mill. That building is directly opposite Elli’s house. It’s only a few yards away, but it sits a few feet lower. Hard to believe, but a public footpath linking Mill Street with the water meadows of The Ham runs past that flooded lower floor!
Phew!
The weather forecast for Gloucestershire over the next week is sunny spells, but getting much colder. I hope that gives the Tewkesbury floods time to recede. We’ve all had enough excitement for this year, and we’re still in the first week!
The first week of 2024 has been an adventure for us, to say the least. It’s a reminder of nature’s power and the importance of community and family support during tough times. How did your new year begin? Share your stories of unexpected challenges and triumphs!
Would you like inside information on my writing life in the English countryside, offers, and more? Then sign up for my newsletter here.
There’s an extract of my latest book, Royal Passion, here, and to buy Royal Passion, click here.
Wishing you all a peaceful and Happy New Year, with my very best wishes for 2024.
I hope to be blogging again soon. Right now typing one-handed is still a bit of a pain!
My next monthly newsletter will be going out in the middle of January. Sign up here to find out all about my next book, Royal Risk, and my current work in progress, Kitten Cupid.
Christians look forward to the good news of the birth of a baby who, in the words of Douglas Adams, ‘…was nailed to a tree for saying how great it would be to be nice to people for a change…’.
But what happens if you hate the commercialisation and enforced jollity that our various winter festivals have become? The pressure to conform, and the loneliness that can strike at this time of year is hard to avoid.
I’m posting some good news here to raise spirits while I can.
Good News!
There was good news for me at the fracture clinic yesterday. With luck, I’ll be in a lighter cast by mid-January. I have regained feeling in all my fingers, although movement remains very restricted in three of them. I keep telling myself that jazz genius Django Reinhardt managed well enough with only two fingers. Trouble is, I’m a writer, not a guitarist!
I’m typing this (with one hand) on 21st December. That’s the Winter Solstice, otherwise known as the Shortest Day. The sun rose this morning just after eight o’clock, and it will set shortly before four pm. It slips behind the trees at lunchtime here, which means part of the garden is in shade from around 1:30pm. Even so, there’s no stopping nature. These crocuses are in a window box outside my office.
The Winter Solstice is actually good news. From now on, the hours of daylight will increase by a few minutes each day. The days will start getting lighter, and longer. It means spring is on the way. People have been saying that to cheer each other up since they were building Stonehenge (right). That’s what you call continuity.
More Good News
I happened on this anecdote on Crazy Days and Nights, a site which is famous for its edgy celebrity gossip.The following story, and many of the comments about the kindness of Gary Sinise, Wendell Pierce, Will Rogers and others, raised my spirits. Here’s the story:
‘There is an A- list actor who has made it his passion the past several years to build as many low income single family homes as he can. Our actor made his name in iconic HBO show that has seen a few cast deaths in the past few years. The people get no interest loans and own their own houses. It was while he was doing this that he ran into several military veterans who were doing construction on one of the houses. They got to talking about other veterans who served and were permanently disabled and were having trouble getting work and therefore having trouble finding places to live. Many ended up homeless or in shelters. Our actor started meeting with veterans groups and also met with an actor that has been in this space before for his work with veterans. Our A- lister started bugging his producer friends to find jobs for the veterans. Our actor also got a group together to purchase two motels for the veterans to stay while they were saving enough to move into their own place. The motels each also have a coffee shop/diner where the veterans can eat, but also work and serve the general public.’
Fancy a break from the hectic round of shopping and cooking? Then browse these selections of free books. They are a great way to discover the work of romance authors you may not have met before. You can choose from Free Steamy Romance I or Free Steamy Romance II.
That’s all for now. If I don’t manage to get back on here before 2024, have a peaceful, pleasant Christmas and New Year.
Would you like inside information on my writing life in the English countryside, offers, and more? Then sign up for my newsletter here.
There’s an extract of my latest book, Royal Passion, here, and to buy Royal Passion, click here.
Disaster! I had an accident last week and broke my wrist, so there will be no blogging for a while from me. I found the last patch of black ice left after a sudden thaw.
You can see the temporary cast that was put on straight afterwards at the top of this blog.
Here’s my elbow, and this was before the bruises came out properly. It’s now a lot darker! The strange lines are pressure marks from the harness-style sling I have to wear.
I hope to be back on here in 2024. Until then, whether you celebrate Christmas or another happy holiday, have a wonderful December and a peaceful, prosperous New Year.
If you’d like inside information on my writing life in the English countryside, offers, news of free books, seasonal recipes, and more, sign up for my newsletter here.
There’s an extract of my latest book, Royal Passion, here, and to buy Royal Passion, click here.
