monday 1 – on way out to office, notice a couple of sites for spanish learning:
muenchen.cervantes.es
powerspanish@gmx.de

thursday 4 – flying to england on easyjet

friday 5 – went swimming at skipton baths, met up with ian (scriv) and andrew, went for beer at narrow boat

saturday 6 – went over to clitheroe, saw mabel and jack, he seemed peaceful, but i didnt get any conversation out of him, just held his hand

sunday 7 – lovely morning, took mum in wheelchair into park to baths, had coffee and chatted, then went back to abbeyfield, sat in sun on a bench, then took her for lunch

monday 8 – working at number 11

tuesday 9 – sat on backstreet eating a pizza with Josh watching his mates do running races up the street, just as i did 40 years ago.

wednesday 10 – wet swimming in the evening, not so much energy but gave it a go

thursday 11 – katie called at 12.30 to say that her dad had died

friday 12 – met up with the lads, pete, steve, spon, mick, brian at the narrow boat, then onto the beer engine, the yorkshire rose, then back to the narrow boat where met phil r with john pearson and also andy w was there after his swimming

saturday 13 – went up to watch the dale fixture with pete and roz, we met up with steve who was already up there

sunday 14 – went swimming with Josh, had great fun with the new goggles I’d brought back from Spain, I liked the Fondo slogan “fun is in the air”.
then had lunch together with mum before catching train to manchester and flight to munich

monday 15 – getting back into things in germany

tuesday 16 – children go back to school today!

wednesday 17 – nice quote from work: “Choose the hard right way over the easy wrong way” Kim Ringeisen, the photographer on this site:
http://www.flyingmonkeyphotography.com

WEG meeting in the evening, get there early and take a walk around the friedhof for quarter of an hour beforehand
meeting was ok, we decide to change administrator, which seems a wise decision

friday 19 – katie left early for the singapore airlines flight to manchester
called the school to ask about eve being excused from school and picked up a confirmation letter, just in case the airline would be strict about a schoolchild flying during term-time, which in the end we didn’t need.
pizza in the evening

saturday 20 – took children to kids club then picked up entry details from schuster and bought the french book which eve needed form huggendubl marienplatz, place is heaving due to first day of the oktoberfest
went back to pick up eve, arrived way too late (mix up with times, 1.30 meant but was there are 2.30), but still got something to eat, then we travelled back

went to the wies’n with andy and friends, chris joe, ben and sue, pleasant evening all round at the oide wies’n
http://herzkasperlzelt.de/

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sunday 21 – john calls me to inform me that Ruth passes away last night, as the hospital decided to turn off the support machine she was on, as kidneys and her organs started packing up
Dashed to the BOB train to Tegernsee for the Tegernseelauf, which I’d dropped down to 10km, results:
Zeit: 0:57:52,3
Strecke:10km
Platz:311
Altersklasse:M50 / Platz pro Altersklasse:25
Differenz zum Sieger:22:25
Minuten pro KM:5:47
Meter pro Minute:172,8
Kilometer pro Stunde:10,4
didn’t push it so much and without much training, I was happy just to finish.

preparing cat food for being away the next 3 days

went to church for christine’s party and david onga’s concert, well attended and lovely event, meant I didn’t need to worry about cooking anything for children’s tea.

went to bed at 10pm ready to get up really early for our flight to UK for the funeral.

monday 22 – taxi arrives at 3.45am takes us to hackerbrücke, stragglers from the oktoberfest still hanging around including some drunks on the s-bahn platform, we narrowly missed a train but got to the airport in reasonable time, although there was a queue to check-in and drop baggage, we made the flight ok though for 6.35am

picked up the car and drove to meet up with katie at bright street, children slept on the journey, then we went to swale’s for lunch

drive over to skipton, bought the guitar which I’d been planning from skipton music centre on belmont bridge, tried another for comparison, but the second-hand spanish one had better bass and a fuller sound overall, I got the Sevilla model:

went to bed reasonably early because katie wanted us to get off by 9am.

tuesday 23 – jack’s funeral, we set off at 9am for service at 11am at the chapel, just for children and spouses, plus mabel and a contingent of helpers, short service, kate (psalm 121) and susan (Keats’ Meg Merrilies) both gave readings, the children waited in the car during the service, then we set off to the crematorium in skipton and only just make it in time, given the time looking for somewhere to park

there are plenty of people there and the extended family, grandchildren etc, chris reads the tribute katie wrote, embellishing it with some material of his own
nice service, good minister

we drive on after the service to the brown cow in chatburn, which was a good place where we could all congregate and then move around the different tables

wednesday 24 – up for the early flight back, katie driving over with us to see us off, then pick up her own car until she flies back
flight is pleasant enough and we get back home for about 2pm.

In an email exchange, nick writes: “funerals are much more about those who remain rather than those who have become remains”

then arriving back, nicole leaves a quote from J.W. von Geothe, which expresses it more humanely:
“Was man tief in seinem Herzen besitzt,
kann man nicht durch den Tod verlieren.”
roughly:
“What you hold deep in your heart,
cannot be lost through death.”

thursday 25 – got up incredibly early (again) to leave at 6am, check that the girls were up and about and to catch the TGV to Stuttgart for a meeting there

friday 26 – working at home fortunately, which gives time to catch my breath after all the travelling
had a long conference call/training session, which I enjoyed, left note for girls not to be disturbed, eve called about half way through, so frantically hit mute button and stayed silent mid-sentence whilst I attended to her!

saturday 27 – kats still away so busy with the washing then cook paella for evening meal, listening to music and ironing

sunday 28 – still looking after home, get down to some more ironing after coming back from church

monday 29 – children off to school, as katie flies back and we’re ships in the night as I set off for the oktoberfest party, marko’s b’day and leaving do arrive at the back of the ochsenbraterei tent to meet the others in glorious sunshine was a good event all told, left at 10pm, one of the last, drinking radler all night, just as well, the volume and strength still means it takes effect

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