The week that was

This has been a really strange week where I've had an absolutely terrible day in it, but a couple of fabulous days too!

The beginning of the week was one I don't want to repeat. First Born(FB)was being discharged from hospital, but her accommodation wasn't going to be ready for 3 weeks, so she was to be taken from the comfort of her hospital ward and dropped at the homeless hostel (I kid you not). She would have to be at the hostel by 6pm each night to get a bed, and would get kicked out at 9am each morning to walk the streets until 6pm came around again. Needless to say there were lots of tears - most of them mine - and so many people in my house trying to come up with a solution that I think Paul thought someone had died when he got home from work. Help came in the form of Saint Joan (AKA Paul's mum) who said she could stay at their house. FB is safe, being fed proper food, and is sleeping in a bed with clean sheets and no fleas (well, I'm assuming not). The down side is that she thinks it is great and a big holiday. However, miracles must happen, and the last I heard FB was going to do some voluntary work!

I've been sorting out my will recently and the first draft arrived for me to proof read this week. It has been horrible trying to make sure everyone is going to be kept in a style they'd like, but I think I have more or less sorted everything, with all my heirlooms split fairly. The one really worrying thing was that my house is being left to someone called Peter. I don't know who he is but I'm sure he hasn't done anything to deserve my house, and I'll have to remember the amend that typo.

Thurday is Bury Times day and I was quite put out when my letter about my MP making sweeping statements about the opinions of his constituents was removed from the website after an hour or two. Personally I think her must have had a word in someones ear, but too late Mr Nuttall. It got on another website and the printed version of the paper did it proud.

On Friday I went to my favourite kind of work meeting, where I get lots of good stories from the police. Yes that's right - I put in a full week! The meeting was held on the top floor of a new building so it was good to have a nosey, and the views were great.

Saturday could have changed my life. I was up at a decent time (well, by 9:30am) to get myself ready and meet up with the rest of The Chorladies for the X Factor auditions. We had to be there by 1:15 pm so we were all running to time and got there early, not long after 12:30. There were hundreds of people already there. We got through the first hurdle and got our numbers, but got told that because of the time we had turned up we may not get in! What I had thought of as great time management was looked on as a lack of commitment. When I'd been waking up, loads of people were already there. It wasn't a complete disaster though. We had a good catch up while we were waiting, and we managed to avoid being covered in unpleasantness when a woman next to us started puking up everywhere. A first aider had to come, but they'd sent a junior as his job was just to mop up. After over an hour quite a lot of people got told to go home, but we could stay so we were feeling quite confident. It didn't last long. After waiting an hour and a half we got told to go home, with an important message - if we came again sleep on the pavement and we may get in! We didn't let it get in the way of a good day out though. I had an overnight pass out in case I got lucky with Simon Cowell. I've never seen X Factor (or the rest of them) and had got him mixed up with Piers Morgan, so I was glad I could go home without a kiss and tell story to write.

Instead of being kept waiting inside the GMEX we got to hit the town. We had a shandy to recharge the batteries by the Bridgewater Hall, then we found a fabulous bar called Taps. Each table has beer taps on it and you help yourself to what you want, in whatever (small) quantity. An iPod touch calculates how much you have had and what the cost is. It looked a great place for a night out and the food looked good too. We just had some posh chips to keep us going.

After that we had an hour on the Manchester beach, currently at the Fan Park in Castelfield. The sun was shining, and we were too early for The Hilton, so it killed a bit of time. Then to Cloud 23 for cocktails. Jolanda was a bit worried about the height, and wouldn't go too close to the glass floor, but she liked it too. It was all finished off with Tapas at Vinos. El Rincon was booked up for the night from early on. We really did have a great day out and made the most of whatever we were dealt.

Sunday wasn't bad too. H and I went to the gym first thing, then we had our monthly visit to the farmer's market in Ramsbottom. Then home for breakfast/lunch/tea all rolled into one and off to Music in the Park in the village. It seemed like all the village was there. Even though it was its 8th year I've never been before as we are always busy. I have a feeling that it normally rains too. We were all settled though by kick off for the world cup final at 7:30pm. Harrison had Spain in the class sweep stake at school so it was Spain we have been rooting for. For a church school we were surprised at the children being involved in this way! However it has worked out really well, and the children have been learning about all the different countries as the tournament has gone on. He has come home from school today with his 'prize' and all his classmates are jealous. He has a big England hat, a football, a football book, 6 packets of football cards, a packet of refs whistles, and a packet of football Haribo!

I'm hoping to be quite boring this week, so with a bit of luck you'll only have a brief update next week! Have a good one.