on not taking things for granted...

This past weekend brought with it dull and grey weather - the kind that makes you restless and want to blow away the cobwebs, so we headed off to the coast with our dog. When we got there it was rather more bracing than anticipated but in a good way - that you can really only appreciate, if you are wrapped up warm and snug, as it was so cold!





After our walk we felt refreshed and were glad we'd made the effort to get some fresh coastal air, even if it was freezing.

The next day, (Monday) we woke up to snow, which was lovely except our heating wasn't on. After much gnashing of teeth I went to the boiler, which happens to be outside, to see if I could relight the pilot light but no joy. Then we discovered we didn't have any gas - I mean - how do you not have gas? I tried phoning the gas company to be told that their office didn't open until 8am grrrrrr - this was at 6.30am so in the end I just went to work.
The journey took longer than usual and I hadn't been at work for more than half an hour when my other half phoned, to say that because of bad weather there was no work - so my boss let me leave in case I got stranded with the weather - so we ended up going all the way back home. When we got home we then discovered that the whole of the village I live in was without gas, so no heat and no hot water on the coldest day of the year so far...

We did have a nice walk though with our dog. The countryside always looks so pretty when it snows...









Once back inside, it was a case of getting the log fire going and keeping warm and making food on a camping stove - quite cozy really.

Yesterday (Tue - I'm now writing this on Wed as my internet got cut off as I was doing this yesterday!)when I got home after work most of the snow had gone and then at about 6.45pm they came to turn my gas back on, (as everyone in the village all one thousand and forty houses had to have their meters turned off individually by a gas engineer) - I could have hugged the engineer as it was pretty cold by this point. Oh the bliss of having central heating again so lovely - until at 7.15pm we had a power cut with no electricity - so no heat, hot water, light and internet etc...until it came back on at 11pm. It was quite nice to have candlelight - though it's always nice if you have a choice in these things!



So I'm feeling pretty thankful about all the things it's so easy to take for granted, especially as some people in the place I live are still without gas. Sometimes you only really appreciate these things when you've gone without...