GrandmasterP

Thanks CT for that useful ,article and MH for making me smile.

Up until we moved here back in October I was a pretty laid back sort. Got the job done and never worried about anything at all. Mrs GMP used to say... " you don't have a nerve in your body." Since we have relocated and I have retired it has hit me just how much needs to be done and my limited capabilities to do stuff. Hence right now I tend to take things very seriously indeed to the extent that I have been thoroughly miserable this two months and more past. Comparing my ' Don't worry be happy' self to who I am right now I much prefered the old GMP to this current manifestation. Hey ho.

Head- Lao tzu Heart - Chuang tzu I liked your 'philosopher/poet' comparison MH. Hadn't thought of them in those terms before.

Well this past week has been a game changer for us here at Chez GMP. We've decided to up sticks and remove from formerly 'deeply rural' to even more deeply isolated sea side. The village next to us is expanding with a 150 home 'executive detached' new estate going up and there's even talk of a bus service. The road by our place seldom saw three cars a day when we moved here now it's almost busy. We've really noticed the 'noise' since we got back. Making an offer on a 200+ year old fisherman's cottage out on a wind swept promontory tomorrow and this old pile goes onto the market on Thursday once the surveyor has done his best. I left school age 15 and straight into full time coolie work followed by the army, just as soon as I discovered that manual work and me didn't really get along. I'm 62 now and after 47 years at work have never yet developed any taste for it. Enough's enough. I shall become a Tao Beach-Bum. Requesting talismans, spells, incantations, chants plus whatever else works for a speedy sale and seamless move. ( Ever the optimist).

Thanks for the kind words guys.

Fake it 'til you make it buddy. I wish my old mum was still round to tear me a new one. Cherish your parents whilst you have them, no one is perfect and once you recognise the triggers you can let them float by. Best wishes to ya.

It took me 47- years work to earn my earthly pension. That Heavenly Pension sure sounds to have better benefits though.

Aye. Lots to look forward to.

Note to self circa June 2014. DON'T DO IT! Oooops, too late, we did. Bleddy awful time of it here right now. Gales, floods, baling out water butts in the night so that wash house won't flood. At least the rats are keeping their heads down, probably too wet for them to venture out. Man did we make a mistake!

Welcome to TTB bikerbeth777. You have a kind and wise friend in Manitou, she is the tops. Hope you enjoy it here.

Cheers buddy. Hoping not to need it but you never know. We've got heavy brain with gales forecast for later. This cottage has been here 200 years but it looks as if the roof has had attention during that time. I flippin' hope so, the place creaks like a ship at sea when the wind is from the east. Uuuuuuuuurrrrrggggghhhhhhh. My bad.

Hope everyone had a great Christmas Day. Best wishes to all for the holidays.

It's very much a learning curve for us right now. Only been here 11 weeks. Mrs GMP took early retirement so was home for the past four years and at the old place she had a network of chums which she's currently missing for sure.

Many thanks Chang. I don't follow Manga so will depart this thread with all good wishes for its success.

I was married at age 17 and the first Mrs GMP was 18. 26 years together and kinda grew up side by side during that time then gradually apart once the kids had grown and flown. Amicable divorce thankfully my great aunt died and left me a house and some land so we were both sorted for homes and finances without arguing the toss. I then had several years living as a crusty old bachelor with a non live in housekeeper who cleaned, washed, ironed and left me a hot meal weekdays . Weekends I ate out or ordered in. Thought that was it for me and was pretty well settled into a routine. I've never been one for the ladies and the very few women I did meet who showed an interest we never quite hit it off until I met the lady who is now Mrs GMP and we've been together 13 years now with our 11the wedding anniversary next May. Never really understood what fulfilment meant before. We're quite different in many ways, Mrs GMP is a practical 'doer of deeds' whereas I am a congenitally lazy procrastinator. Thus far this has made retirement quite interesting as we're more or less together 24/7. Due to the isolated place we've moved in to there's seldom anyone else to see or speak to except each other.

Lovely posts all. I was raised by my paternal grandparents and granddad had been in WW 1 but never spoke about it. He was a great guy and very wise but of that generation where men didn't really show or speak of emotions I often think maybe if I'd asked a few more questions.... Maybe it's the long nights that set me to reminiscing. "Our almost-instinct almost true: What will survive of us is love." ( Larkin).

If LOA worked then I for one would have won big on the lottery by now. Nada so far but one lives in hopes. It's a nice idea but there's an old saying that goes... "If wishes were horses then beggars would ride." I do believe in Positive Thinking though a positive mindset makes for a generally cheerier outlook on life than a negative one. Positive people are more 'attractive' to others so tend to have happier social and/ or neighbourly encounters than do Gloomy Gussies who other folks might avoid.

I kinda missed the reference here. Is Hunter X Hunter a TV show of a video game perhaps?

Lovely, beautifully written post and so true. Thank you Manitou.

I'm not a Freemason but Mrs GMP and I have been invited to a few Lodge Charity Dinners. They say that they are not a secret society but a society with secrets. The Lodge rooms at Leicester Masonic HQ are pretty impressive plus they have a museum of Masonry and are keen to invite interested people in. In the main the members we met were middle aged or older, mostly businessmen types, some retired policemen, no 'blue collar' job type chaps. To me it seemed more of a social and networking type setup than anything particularly esoteric.

Well I finished it. Bit dark it was too. Onto something cheerier now Louise Penny's How the Light Gets In French Canadian detective crime thriller set at Christmas.

Possibly 'Eccentric' here, some of my former students have described me thus in the past. That said there's a saying here in England ... "If you are poor you are called crazy but if you are rich you're eccentric." Now I'm a poor pensioner maybe I'm crazy.

Yep..... "One night, in a private boarding house in Scarborough, a railwayman vanishes, leaving his belongings behind... It is the eve of the Great War, and Jim Stringer, railway detective, is uneasy about his next assignment. It's not so much the prospect Scarborough in the gloomy off-season that bothers him, or even the fact that the last railwayman to stay in the house has disappeared without trace. It's more that his governer, Chief Inspector Saul Weatherhill, seems to be deliberately holding back details of the case - and that he's been sent to Scarborough with a trigger-happy assistant. And when Jim encounters the seductive and beautiful Amanda Rickerby a whole new personal danger enters Jim's life..."

The Last Train to Scarborough by Andrew Martin. A 'Jim Stringer - Railway Detective' crime fiction paperback. One of a series that I've enjoyed so far. Right now I'm on easy reading.