I was already awake, albeit still dozing a little, when Nick popped into the room this morning looking for some soccer clothing for Joseph’s football game this morning. My body clock was in the process of getting me up anyway, s that was all the impetus needed to get me fully awake and active.
On the agenda for today was to pop into Smyths Toys in Lakeside. As a part of the strategy to manage Joey’s questions about why he wasn’t invited to come on this trip, I had told him I would let him pick something out from Smyths. I discussed this with Kerry this morning, and she pointed out there is a Smyths Toys shop nearby, meaning I wouldn’t have to travel all the way to Lakeside. I also wanted to do something for Joesph and Isla, Kerry & Nick’s two youngest (8 & 10). Rather than to try and randomly find something appropriate for the kids, I invited Isla to go with me, which she eventually agreed to. Isla is the sweetest, most adorable, charming, and shy little girl you could ever wish to meet. She and Joseph, the older of the two, are so well-behaved and laid back that you’d hardly notice they were there – a testament to their parents’ good parenting.
When we made it to the toy shop, I Facetimed Joey to show him what Transformers they had. That was easier said than done, as he had evidently gone back to bed again. His sleep rhythms have been all over the place lately, and I had to send a ping to his phone to nudge him into action. He did eventually show up on my mobile phone screen and we looked over the Transformer aisle together. From the four options he previously sent me photos of, we found two they had available, so I picked them both off the shelf.
I invited Isla, who had been trailing me patiently, to explore the shop with me to find something she and her brother would like. Rather than walk straight to something and point at it, Isla was quite reluctant to pick something out for herself. I could see she was a little skittish about the prices and not wanting to pick something too expensive, but I gave her a couple of nudges here and there about what she could get. She eventually gravitated towards a Jelly Glow box, so I made it clear she was welcome to take it if that’s what she wanted. We then found a box of pencils & paints arts and crafts box for Joseph. He had been working on one of my colouring books with a set of coloured pencils yesterday, so that seemed like a good choice for him also. We took our toys to the register to pay and returned to Kerry’s.
Back at home base, Joseph was very grateful for his ‘little something’ and so polite about it. I always get a warm and fuzzy feeling inside when I can put a smile on a child’s face. In these situations, it’s not always clear who gets the better end of the deal – them or me.
I called Jae to discuss the plan for the next couple of hours with her. We planned to visit my little sister, Little Jacky, in Stevenage later this evening, but Jae wanted to wing by Lakeside in the meantime. I drove to Dad’s house to collect Jae, and off we went to Lakeside.
Once at Lakeside, Jae made a beeline for the Bubble Tea kiosk on the ground floor, swiftly followed by a trip to her other favourite snack stand, where she (and by that, I mean I) bought a couple of hot pretzels (and I should point out that Jae only ate one of them by the end of the day!). These two little snack stand pleasures were half the reason why Jae wanted to visit Lakeside, to begin with. The other reason was a trip to the HMV shop, where I spent the next half hour enjoying myself waiting helplessly for Jae to sift through the thousands of items on display there aimlessly. Fortunately, I stumbled into a couch in the corner and parked myself there until she had flushed all the shopping urges out of her system.
By now, it was lunchtime, so we made our way to the food court. That was a tactical error. Everyone else at Lakeside seemed to have the same idea, so the upper-level food court was teeming with hordes of irate shoppers all playing a scrappy game of musical chairs, which were in chronic short supply. I hiked around the food court and asked about a dozen other lunch-goers whether the spare chair at their table was actually available before I eventually found a couple to drag to the one table Jae had jealously latched onto.
Lunch was a thoroughly unpleasant and unsatisfying event, further reinforcing my already heightened hatred for being at shopping centres. We packed up and made our way back to the car.
I needed to refuel the car, so I drove the kilometre or so around the other side of the shopping complex to the Tescos petrol station. That thirty-minute drive through mostly stationary traffic reminded me of the other reason why I’m not too fond of shopping centres. My irritation wasn’t alleviated by having to re-position the car to a different pump after finally getting there because the one I initially chose didn’t want to accept my credit card for whatever reason. After eventually filling up the car, we slipped back into the stationary grid-locked traffic and inched painfully slowly around the road system again. We eventually meandered onto the M25 motorway and headed North towards Stevenage.
The drive to Little Jacky’s house in Stevenage took around an hour, during which time Jae and I went to town honing our car karaoke skills (and I use the word skill quite wrongly).
Little Jacky and Ella gave us a warm welcome when we arrived. Ella has matured somewhat since the last time we visited (kids tend to do that), and we all had a lot of fun catching up with each other. Ella reminds me a little of Annie, one of my other sisters. She’s a little scatty and a little naïve, but endearing and a lot of fun in the process.
Jacky had booked us into a Toby Carvery restaurant just up the road from her house. We were all looking forward to tucking into a lovely giant roast Yorkshire pudding, a signature feature of the carvery dinner at Toby’s.
It was pretty busy when we arrived. Although we were seated straight away, the queue at the carvery was long and winding. When we made it to the carvery counter, there was a note posted informing diners that there were no Yorkshire puddings. I remember thinking just how livid Sandy would have felt if she had been here with us.
We sat and enjoyed the dinner, although the pancake patty they dished out instead of the Yorkshire pudding was not an adequate substitute. The meal was mediocre at best. I was ready to make my views known to the staff, but Jacky was mortified at the prospect since people working there were friends of her friends, and she wanted to escape the potential embarrassment of me making a scene. Well, what’s a chap to do? That was like a red rag to a bull. I resolved in my mind not to volunteer any comments about the food…unless I was directly asked, at which point I would let them have both barrels. I’m sure Jacky wouldn’t encourage me to lie, right? Despite all my interactions with the staff, when it came time to settle the bill, not one of them ended up asking how the food was. Alas, my opportunity thus slipped away, and Jacky was spared the indignity.
We decided to swing past Maccas for dessert, as the kids wanted some ice cream. Ella, bless her, insisted on sitting in the front seat. Being on the right side of the car (my car is left-hand-drive), she would then be able to exercise her social skills by placing the order and making payment. A hilarious sequence of slapstick events ensued, which had the entire car in fits of laughter for the remainder of the evening. Firstly, Ella neglected to ask for extra Oreos on her McFlurry despite clear instructions from several directions as she was ordering. Not to worry; she’d just need to clarify this at the next window before making payment by tapping her mother’s credit card on the card reader. This could not be a more straightforward task, or so the rest of the car mistakenly thought. Several of us reminded her to ask about the Oreos before tapping the card on the read. Notwithstanding this clear instruction, when the card reader was thrust out of the window, the very first thing Ella did, almost on auto-pilot, was tap the credit card, to the mass amusement of everyone now in fits of laughter – including Ella. She did then remember the instructions about asking for extra Oreos, but the poor young man at the window probably thought the laughing occupants of the car were trying to pull a fast one by paying first and then asking for the extras second. Ella’s embarrassment was not yet complete. We had to park in the adjacent car park to wait for our ice cream. When the staff member approached Ella’s open window, he had the ice cream and a hot apple pie on a tray. Rather than take the items from the tray, Ella practically fought the staff member for the tray itself, with the poor young lad trying to battle his confusion of Ella trying to take the tray from him. By this time, half the car was pissing themselves uncontrollably.
Back at Jacky’s, we chit-chatted for a bit before Jae and I bid a fond farewell and made it back to the car for the one-hour trip back to Essex. Other than some periodic speed restrictions due to a plethora of roadworks, the trip in the dark was uneventful. Jae glued herself to her mobile phone for the duration while I focussed on driving through the drizzle.
I popped into Dad’s to say hello when I dropped Jae off before returning to Kerry’s house for the night. I spent the remainder of the evening enjoying Kerry & Nick’s company before we all peeled off one by one to bed. I barely had the energy left to write up this blog’s notes, resolving to write and post the actual blog in the morning instead. I was swiftly asleep after turning in.