Happy New Year. And last year.

2019? Already? Gosh.

I could attempt to sum up everything that's been going on in life since the last post on here but frankly who has the time for that?

Highlights:

Another trip to Japan, this time with Middle Sis as well as Mr WithaY, which was fabulous. We're definitely going back, but not till after the 2020 Olympics.

A trip to Italy - Bologna - my first visit to the country and hopefully not my last.  The FOOD!  The WEATHER!  The Food!  Oh my dears. 

Arrival of a new family member - a great-niece who has been partly named after my lovely Mum (her great-grandma) and departure of others - splits rather than bereavements, thankfully.

Left a job which was making me utterly miserable, and found a new one just over a year ago which suits me far better.  I'm now working for an online bookseller, a bit like Amazon but much smaller and far less evil, doing customer service, a bit of marketing, and a bit of book selection. I get to look at forthcoming titles, read proofs, make suggestions and try to support authors and books which I think are worth supporting.  I love it.

I've also been able to reduce my hours so that I work a 4-day week now, which gives me one non-working day a week (as well as weekends) to get on with all the other stuff I like to do.

Mr WithaY and I have been having more work done on the house and garden. We are now the proud owners of a decent patio and driveway.  With flat level paving all round the house. And a new shed. 

There's also a pond in the offing; we have all the component parts and Mr WithaY has all the plans drawn up. It just needs a few days when he's around to get it all dug out/concreted in/assembled.  I'm a bit vague on the details. What I DO know is that there will be water lilies and irises, and a few little fish to make sure we're not inundated with mosquitos.

It took about 3 months to get all the work completed so we missed much of the glorious weather last summer, but I think we used the outside space more in the remaining couple of weeks of summer than we did the whole of the previous year. I am very much looking forward to this summer so we can get out there and enjoy the outside space.

We've both had some health stuff going on, nothing too life-threatening, but I have to have surgery at some point this year which will be tiresome. I had all the pre-op stuff done back in September and was cheerfully getting on with life under the assumption that I'd get a call for my operation in the next month or so at the latest.  No. 

I rang the relevant clinic today to find out if they had any idea when I'd have to show up.  There's an EIGHT month waiting list, so I am likely to be summoned to hospital in May or June.  Which would be ok if we hadn't just booked (and paid for) our summer holiday, which happens in May.

I have let the hospital know this.

How much do we bet that even though they have my unavailability dates, I will receive a letter from them asking me to come and have bits lopped out right in the middle of that period?

I shall be in Uzbekistan.

So. In the main, it's all ok.