Long time away

When I first started this, I had just retired and was used to writing every day to Barbara. I thought that this would be a piece of cake. Events have conspired against me. Let me catch up.
I wrote about leaving to go to the pub quiz at the end of my last post. There was a bit of drama there. One team who occasionally attend were spotted "phoning a friend" and, when they won, there were rumblings of discontent. I left pretty early so I don't know if anything was said but they didn't turn up last Thursday. Gave us a chance to win again. Still a low score but never mind eh?
PARK came across to bring the grandchildren. They stayed for the weekend and then went and brought Grandma Mags over so she could babysit on Monday afternoon. Phil and Amanda wanted to attend Harry's funeral. Phil picked Lisa up and took her and Barbara up to Church at 1130am to help with the catering party. I walked up with Phil and Amanda just before 1pm and went onto car park duty but I wasn't needed.
The funeral was different. There was a guard of honour awaiting the funeral cars and the coffin came in to a slow march followed in by 16 standard bearers from various ex servicemen associations. The minister was excellent even though he didn't know Harry. He was ably assisted by Clive who gave the eulogy, Sue who lead the prayers and myself who did the reading. One of Harry's colleagues finished the service with a quote from the "We will remember them" poem by Laurence Binyon (1869-1943) followed by the Last Post, two minutes silence and the Reveille. Very moving and Harry surely enjoyed it. Afterwards, there was a buffet in the Church Hall and a chance for Audrey and the girls to meet the guests.
Our lot went to the Sailmakers down on St Andrews for a meal. We took the grandchildren in our car which enabled Phil and Amanda to go home with Mags leaving us with the grandchildren for the week.
It was a miserable day on Tuesday so we went to see "Surf's Up" It kept the kids occupied but I noticed Barbara dozing! Rowan came home and went on the computer and looked for games. He soon finished the official give aways and went searching. I always fear the worse when he's been on but so far so good!
On Wednesday, we did the museum tour. We went to park'n'ride. A bargain as the kids were free. Our first visit was to Dinostar on Humber Street. It was okay although I fear that Kirsten is a bit young just yet. Still there were stamps to collect and various other bits and pieces to find. The information was all very interesting if a little old for our two. They particularly enjoyed revealing the "fossils" in the sand pit. We walked up and had a sandwich in the Trinity Tea Shoppe which was eaten all up. Then we went to the Museum Quarter and went into the Hull and East Riding Museum and the Streetlife Museum. Again, a little bit old but they enjoyed all the stuff especially the ride in the Mail coach in the Streetlife. Again I was asked about being a volunteer on the Arctic Corsair once I was recognised. I'll have to see how the next couple of months goes.
Thursday, the weather improved so we packed up and went to Wilsthorpe beach south of Bridlington. It wasn't very warm but it stayed fine and we were sheltered by the dunes as we were sat eating. The tide was out so the huge expanse of beach was ours as a playground. Rowan and I set about damming the little stream then knocking it down and building it again. I buried both the kids and Barbara built an excellent castle with Kirsten. We decided to have and ice cream and leave so packed the car then went for the ice cream. As we were walking back, it started spitting so we timed it right.
Friday was again poor so we walked up to Morrisons for some shopping in the morning. In the afternoon, we went down to the Humber foreshore and walked along and into the Country Park. In fact, we stayed longer than we'd planned as it was the best part of the day. And that was the weeks babysitting because we took them home on Saturday but that's for another session!