Changing Times

Hello everyone.

Well, it doesn’t rain but it pours. The community centre burned down last week! Ethel Compton, who teaches cookery class, left chip pan on while she spent a penny. Her class had left with their muffins but she stayed on to cook her tea.

She’s caused no end of damage but everyone got out okay, though a few folk had to be kept in hospital overnight including Sylvie.

Molly Chadwick was running her speed-dating night and fainted with the smoke, Percy tried to give her the kiss of life but Molly reckons he were just trying it on. Mind you, her wig got left behind in kerfuffle, she were mortified.

Lester was a hero, he got everyone out before fire engines arrived, he was in quite a bad way but is recovering now. Though, he lost his guitar in the fire. We’re having a collection and Ivy’s son, Brian (who thinks he’s Elvis), is going to choose a replacement for him. Lester burnt his deadlocks, so he’s had to have them cut off.

Poor Sylvie, as if she hasn’t had enough to deal with lately. I rushed over t’ hospital after Clint called me last Monday. She had to be put on oxygen but she were more shocked than anything else. Clint took me back to their flat and I packed her personals as she didn’t want him rifling through her drawers and then I came back and sat with her until she nodded off.

Annabel opened up the next day and I came in while 11.00am and checked on Sylvie. She looked much better but her hair stank of smoke and chip fat but I didn’t like to say.

Annabel gave her the rest of the week off, so it was just the two of us which has been a nightmare. She stands and points while munching her way through carrot sticks and pumpkin seeds, she should be in a pen.

The drama group is putting on ‘Cabaret’ and Annabel wants the part of Sally Bowles, but she’s got two left feet and can’t hold a note. She thought I was jealous but I said I have no intention of auditioning for the role as I know my limitations, unlike others.

That madam said ‘You have such low self-esteem. You can be quite the idiot at times’. I didn’t show that she’d upset me, even though she had.

Sylvie made me laugh today when she said how Annabel can’t get off a chair without cracking her knees, let alone dance on one!

When I popped back to Sylvie’s flat to get her overnight things, I noticed that she has a picture of Eric in a heart-shaped frame on her bedside table. She still loves him very much. It’s not that easy to fall out of love with someone, even when they break your heart.

She told me that Eric once said to her ‘Don’t love me too much’. Whatever kind of thing is that to say? Everyone wants to know they’re loved.

But she’s a survivor, like Elizabeth Taylor, only with less jewellery. Sylvie said she can’t bear to look at her bracelet anymore as Eric bought a charm for every wedding anniversary. I do believe he always loved her but he was a very weak and foolish man. I think he would have eventually come to his senses and stayed with Sylvie.

That Doreen Bradley sounds like she trapped Eric with a kiddie and squeezed every penny out of him while Sylvie just got on with it and never complained. She was devoted to her family and took in Eric’s aunt Lil when she first became poorly, even though she had Clint to raise.

She once told me how she stayed in for three years waiting for Prozac to kick in. Sylvie keeps a beautiful home, not a thing out of place. Eric didn’t know when he was well off.

I went with Clint to see Lil last weekend while Sylvie rested. I took her a Bakewell tart and Lil accused me of trying to stab her with a teaspoon, I didn’t know where to put my face. I’ve only met her a few times but she doesn’t seem to like me very much.

Though, she pressed a chocolate coin into my hand as I left and said to buy some sweets for myself. I think her mind is starting to let go a bit now.

Lil's a good few summers past sixty and not in the best of health. She kept calling Clint ‘Eric’ and scalded him about Doreen which didn't go down too well, but he managed to hold it together. I thought he drove home a bit too quickly for my liking but I said nowt.

Well, this cold snap is kicking in but I can't afford to have heating on all the time, so me and Bella go to bed at 8.00pm and watch TV. Poor Queenie Grayson from flats died of hyperthermia last week. Winter can be cruel on the old folk.

Mind you, she'd been shop-lifting at Lidl and had two frozen legs of lamb under her anorak. By the time the number 45 came along she were frozen rigid. That bus service is getting worse.

I bumped into my neighbour the counsellor last week, she was going to work in blue jeans and pumps. She explained it was casual Friday!

Whatever next? I don't care how casual Friday becomes, you won't catch me going to work in my housecoat and espadrilles. I blame that Germaine Greer. Woman's libber? It wouldn't hurt for her to put a comb through her hair every so often.

Anyway, Sidney's still hovering over his laptop, I'm at his bungalow typing this blog but he wants to get back to his project. He's compiling a list of music hall performers from the North of England. He's very thorough when he gets stuck into something.

But the sooner Argos Alan can get the computers, the better, as Sidney's not very good at sharing things. Lester said he'll continue to teach us at our homes. He's a good lad. He's been wearing a tee-shirt with 'Barack To The Future' written across the front!

I think Mr Obama will make a grand president because he has a very stylish wife. She's like Jackie Kennedy whose handbag always matched her shoes. That's very important when you're standing next to your husband in front of the nation.

It was forks to the left and politics to the right in our house. Ted thought Margaret Thatcher was a very handsome woman in her day; he’d look at me and snap ‘I bet she doesn’t stuff used tissues up her cardigan sleeve’. He could be very cutting at times.

Hopefully, we’ll be up and running on our own computers soon, so Sylvie will be with you next Monday with her week’s news.

Keep wrapped up.

God bless, Joyce xx