I spent some time at mums this weekend where we have been getting out some Christmas decorations and putting up Christmas trees. Dad will not be around this year and with us losing him at the beginning of this year and him becoming unwell last Christmas with his last pint being on Christmas eve in a pub out with me and his last full meal being on Chirstmas day it will be da different sort of feel to Christmas.
Mum’s tree in officeMums main tree in homeTwo little fellas fresh out of their box
When I got home this afternoon I decorated my first tree in my own home. I wanted to do it this year as with things being different so I fancied a change myself and getting a tree putting it up and decorated it will bring a little Christmas cheer into my home though it won make up for the storm clouds we faced last year.
For those of us that use Facebook to stay in touch with friends and family through it, you might have also noticed that there are a lot of adverts these days appearing on your screen on Facebook, advertised all sorts of things fronted by people and business that have set up pages to pay Facebook to advertise their products on.
I purchased 2 t-shirt’s from Facebook from a website that was advertising its items from a USA website called Soulisfree and the T-shirts arrived and fit as the correct size as sold and I really liked them, one was a black t-shirt with a full sun equinox taking place on the front of the T-shirt and the other as pictured below was called ‘Wandering into the digital world”. The image was one that looked like Alice in Wonderland lifting up a curtain to reveal the code from the matrix in her reality. I thought both T-shirts were cool and looked great. I was so pleased when they both safely arrived with me back in September.
Alice in the matrix
The buying of the T-shirts gave me a false sense of security that buying on Facebook might actually be ok and could have improved since the bad old days of items turning up wrongly sized or misadvertised. So back in September I started getting a lot of adverts promoting advent calendars and one that caught my eye was entitled ‘The Lord of the Rings Christmas Advent Calendar – Collector’s Edition’. I have never bought an advent calendar for myself, don’t own a Christmas tree or decorations but thought it might be a nice idea to buy the calendar and possibly even use the advent calendar items as Christmas decorations and even get a Christmas Tree.
I thought the little figures looked great and what could go wrong trying to buy them on Facebook too, Facebook is a big company with a multimillion pound slick business operation what on earth could go wrong. so I purchased the calendar from a chinese company advertising its shop on Facebook.
Well that was the middle of September when I tried to buy the above item and I don’t think anything is on its way. I had a confirmation of purchase and confirmation of postage sent to me but everything else has gone wrong. The (none Facebook, website crashes when I try to click on it to get an update on my order or ask them when it might arrive). The company has also stopped advertising the calendar on Facebook although they still have some other active calendar adverts on Facebook.
I have tried contacting Facebook asking the to remove the advertising page from their site and shut down the businesses advertising pages on Facebook to stop more people giving this business money for goods that do not arrive. It took me about 4-5 hours to work out how to make a complaint on Facebook and I did this with the help of google search, but its very difficult to complain about past adverts, unless you know what your doing on Facebook.
It’s almost deliberately difficult so that people just don’t bother reporting past fraudulent sites and pages on Facebook which is a huge con by the companies and criminal entities pretended to sell stuff through Facebook shopping windows. Facebook are not stupid and incompetent they are complicit with the the criminal activity taking place through their pages.
Fortunately for me I purchased the imaginary calendar through a PayPal payment and so PayPal have already refunded my purchase and so I am not out of pocket. But for those that end up handing their account details directly to criminal entities operating on Facebook I do feel sorry for those potentially mis sold customers as you just don’t know what they will do with those account details once they have them. I also don’t know why Facebook make it so easy for people to be ripped off through their site, very poor customer practises which they must profit from considerably.
Our family get together for Christmas 2024 with my Mum, my Dad and my Dad’s partner Shamen – we always try and get together for a Christmas meal as close to Christmas day as possible and this year we all turned up at my mums for a festive meal enjoyed by us all on Christmas day.
It’s strange I started writing this at 4:42am on the Monday 30th December after not much sleep thinking about what Christmas means to me and what the future might hold in 2025. Christmas means different things to different people. Whether it’s a religious festival for the birth of the son of god and your messiah, a chance to have a holiday and relax at a cold and bleak time of the year, a chance to reflect on what just happened in the year that has just taken place and plan or prepare for what might happen in 2025. Or a chance to catch up and spend time with family, for me it’s a mixture of many of those listed above.
I’m thinking alot about the time at the moment, the time we have, times that are special, times that change and when there is no time left at all.
Well its new years eve already tomorrow, doesn’t time just fly
So it is 12 nights before Christmas day, lots going on in Exeter with the build up to Christmas we are having a ‘Christmas breakfast’ tomorrow for work colleagues, rather than an organised Christmas night out, I think the boss is afraid to meet up with too many staff that have had too many drinks in case they have a go at him, so he’s chickened out of allowing us to have a Christmas staff night out this year.
The world has some potential good news for a change and a little unexpected too with nations at COP28 the UN climate summit agreeing for the first time to take explicit aim at the use of fossil fuels. The talks in Dubai came close to collapse but in a dramatic turn-around, nations agreed to “transition away” from coal, oil and gas.
But my mood for the night is one of contemplation for the past, present and future. Sorry to be brief but sometimes a much needed mulching over of my minds view, thoughts and feelings are much needed and this just so happens to be one of those times.
So last week the presents were bought, holidays were booked and plans were being made for family Christmas celebrations to begin this weekend. This time last week I was out with some friends at a bar in Exeter listening to and singing a little to in a bar on the kareoke night.
The following day I had the day off work all prearranged as a little Christmas treat to myself. I then get a call from my mum in the morning saying she had been awake most of the night in considerable pain and had seen her doctor and needed to go into hospital today in order to get some medical help. We both agreed I should get out to her house as soon as I could and Dad had kindly offered to meet up with her and driver her into hospital.
So I get to mums to look after her dog Milly while she is taken into hospital by dad. At this time we did not know if she was going to be in for days or for the day. Her dog is a rescue dog and normally barks when she sees me and certainly does not trust me. But in the time that mum was out the house I needed to let the dog out in the garden to do its business and then try and pursade her to come into house again. We did this little dance twice over a few hours. Though not sure how many times the dog would have listened to me.
So mum was able to be in the hospital and back in a day after having been examined and given more medication to help her. She was still in and still today is in a lot of pain but is gradually getting better and hopefully things are presently stable and going in the right direction. I’ve been staying with her since last Friday and though I try to help I’m not 100% sure if as a son I get in the way and make mess rather than be here as a help.
I was due to take some holiday leave the week after New year but cancelled that leave and booked off this week instead. So I’m still at my mums tonight typing this blog on my tablet. I have not tried writing on my tablet before so apologies if my spelling is poor in this blog post. Mum will not be well enough to eat Christmas diner this Sunday and the bulk of the food is in the freezer presently so we’re going to postpone the meal until next weekend when hopefully she will be feeling better. She asked if I wanted to postpone the present opening and I said, hell no. So we’re still going to open the presents on Christmas day.
I have offered and am well up for cooking Christmas Dinner when we do finally have it I love cooking and enjoy cooking for myself and others. One problem being is mum’s house is spotless and I am a messy cook but I will do my best to cook a good meal for me, my mum, my dad and his partner when we all get together to have the belated Christmas meal in a week or so.
I’m a natural born worrier and I do worry about my parents health. Ever since my brother took his own life I feared, worried and realised that more responsibility will be placed on my shoulders concerning trying to help my parents as we all get older. I guess you just try to do what you can, enjoying the good times and try to do your best to help in the not so good times.
Today was my last day in work until Christmas. I now have one week off until I log into my work computer again to do some work and even better than that I managed to get all the work that I hoped to do today done. Presents bought and wrapped, Christmas songs playing on Spotify. Though this Christmas is in no way normal for pretty much everyone.
Merry Christmas 2020 one and all
In a normal year in the week building up to Christmas day I would be out on a Wednesday night like tonight listening to music in a bar exchanging cards, gifts and stories with friends whilst getting merry with a Christmas Guinness or two.
I’m afraid I am not a household drinker of alcohol so lockdown drinking does not really happen for me. I still have four cans of Guinness being kept cool in my fridge that I was given from my workplace for leaving my old job back in July. There is something lovely about a social pint in a bar with friends, family or strangers just does not do when drinking at home on my own. Therefore I just don’t drink alcohol at home alone.
They say people forget what they do when they drink (too much). But for me some of my most cherished memories are from times when I was having a drink with strangers, family or friends.
Back to Christmas!
Gabrielle Aplin – Happy Xmas (War is Over)
In a normal year my bags would be packed now and I would be on the first train out of Exeter to visit my mum to stay with her for Christmas. I even booked the day off work Christmas eve to travel to Cornwall. But we all took the decision not to meet up for Christmas this year and have a catcup around Easter 2021 instead or after Mum has had a vaccination against Covid-19 first and is in a better position to be protected against the virus. After such a difficult time the one thing I did not want to give to either of my parents for Christmas is the risk of bringing Covid-19 to either of my parents, so better to be safe than sorry.
Instead I will be spending Christmas with a friend who also would have been spending it alone in Exeter this year due to his circumstances too, so our social bubble is legal and legit for a Christmas day meal together. He is vegetarian so nearly all of the food I am cooking is vegetarian, all bought and ready to cook. I am really looking forward to it. I even have some Guinness flavoured coffee to get me going on Christmas morning.
Slade – Merry Christmas Everybody
So here it is Merry Christmas from Exeter in the UK its just gone 12 midnight and it is now officially Christmas Eve 2020 here. I look to the future now, its only just begun. I hope you do to.
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