Christmas 2022

Funerals are never cheerful occasions, if there is such a thing, and it was with sadness that, on 19th December, I joined a church full of friends to attend the funeral of Eddie Gregory. Eddie, a fellow Market Harborough rugby player, had lost his battle with cancer. He was big in stature and even bigger in heart, with an infectious smile. Although we never played together or against each other on the pitch, what I knew of the man commanded both my respect and my presence at a celebration of his life.

The rest of the day didn’t pass without incident. On returning from the funeral, I was irritated to find that the electric garage door wouldn’t open. Further investigation revealed no power to the garage or part of the house. Attempts to reset the RCD system failed, as it kept tripping out. Eventually, it reset after I’d unplugged all appliances, and I began reconnecting everything one by one to identify the culprit. Strangely, with everything plugged back in, the system didn’t trip again.

However, about half an hour later, the power went off once more. Despite unplugging and reconnecting things again, the system remained dead. With the garage door still inoperable, I had to lift it manually when Sue returned from visiting a friend, and received a slight electric shock from the mechanism in the process. Using a circuit tester, I discovered that the garage fridge, along with most other metal objects, was carrying a small current. Somewhere, the electricity was being grounded improperly.

Fortunately, we have a maintenance policy that covers such issues. I called the provider, only to be told they were extremely busy and it could be up to five days before an electrician could visit.

The following day, Sue drove to the cinema in Corby to see the film Matilda. Disappointingly, I couldn’t join her, as I had to remain at home in case the electrician made an appearance. I was rather surprised when she returned just an hour later. It turns out the cinema itself had developed an electrical fault, which led to a small fire. Sue arrived at the same time as the fire service, to find a line of moviegoers, drinks and popcorn in hand, calmly filing out.

The day before Christmas Eve, I kept my appointment with the doctor and came away with some painkillers and a referral for an X-ray on my troublesome foot. That afternoon, Jamie called in briefly with Ruth, having just had the cast removed from his broken wrist at Kettering Hospital.

Not long afterwards, an electrician arrived to look into our ongoing garage power issue, but it proved beyond him. When testing the circuits, he discovered that the earth was live, indicating a fault either in the cabling or one of the sockets. Further investigation failed to identify the exact cause, so he left after isolating the garage from the mains supply. I ran an extension lead from the house to keep the fridge and freezer running and prevent the contents from defrosting.

Later that same evening, around 11 pm, I received a phone call from Lee informing us that Sarah had been admitted to Nuneaton Hospital. We already knew she’d been feeling unwell with sinusitis, but the pain in her face had become severe, and pre-eclampsia was being considered. After being examined, she was eventually discharged in the early hours of the morning with antibiotics and given a follow-up appointment at 9 am at Hinckley Hospital. There, the doctor prescribed eardrops to relieve the pain. Thankfully, pre-eclampsia was ruled out as the cause.

Late on Christmas Eve morning, a poorly Sarah, armed with antibiotics and painkillers, arrived with her family to drop off Mia before heading to the Black Horse in Foxton for lunch with Charlotte and her family. Earlier in the day, Suraj had brought over a selection of specially made pizzas from Asda for a family snack later that evening.

Jamie, Ruth, and Joey spent their Christmas Eve lunch with Ruth’s parents in Waltham on the Wolds. Her parents had driven from their home in France to enjoy some family time during the festive season. Afterwards, they looked after the dogs while Jamie, Ruth, and Joey journeyed to Market Harborough for tea at a friend’s house. They arrived at Willow Bank around 7 pm, just in time to join in with the party games organised by Charlotte and Sarah.

It was Alice’s first Christmas when she could fully take part in the Yuletide fun, though for the other children, the magic had started to fade with age. They’ll have to wait until they’re older still to once again rediscover the wonder of the season, this time through their own children’s eyes.

Thankfully, Santa arrived overnight, leaving a large pile of presents beneath the festively decorated tree in the lounge. The modern celebration of Christmas has most definitely become the domain of the youngest family members, as evidenced by the wildly disproportionate distribution of gifts, seemingly in inverse proportion to age!

As is tradition, Christmas Day began early with excited discoveries beneath the tree, followed by a return to bedrooms to investigate what treasures had been left in the Christmas socks.

After breakfast, cooked by Lee and eagerly consumed by the family, it was time to get down to the serious business of present opening. This year’s principal distributing elves were Ellis and Joey, with the occasional helping hand from Alice. Remarkably, there was very little chaos from discarded wrapping paper and boxes. For once, gift recipients managed to keep pace with the deliveries and dutifully deposited the festive shrapnel into one of the many bin bags strategically placed around the room.

Charlotte took the role of head chef for Christmas dinner, ably supported by several glasses of Baileys and the occasional bit of advice from the more senior members of the family. With twelve of us to be seated in the dining room, I had expected things to be a little cramped, but even with two large dogs stretched out on the carpet (keeping sensibly close to the source of food), movement in and out of the room posed no problem.

Dinner was excellent. All the traditional trimmings were on offer; it was nothing short of a banquet. So, we could hardly blame Harry, who, like Mia, had waited patiently and in vain for dropped or passed-down titbits, when he quietly slipped into the kitchen. Taking full advantage of his height, he managed to help himself to a plate of turkey offcuts before being caught in the act by a suspicious Suraj. ☺☺☺

It was during the post-dinner clear-up that calamity struck. Sue was washing the crockery at the sink while Ruth dried, when Sue badly cut her wrist on the jagged edge of a broken ceramic lid. The laceration was wide and very deep, clearly in need of suturing. We had long since run out of steri-strips; I’d never thought to replace them, assuming we’d little use for such things now the children had grown up and left home.

I fashioned a couple of makeshift strips from an ordinary plaster and managed to close the wound before bandaging it. Sue was in a bad way, clearly suffering from shock. Suraj, being the only one of us sober enough to drive, took charge. After a quick attempt at the local hospital, we were redirected to Kettering.

Despite it being Christmas Day, with a nurse’s strike ongoing and the waiting room full, as soon as we arrived at A&E with Sue in a wheelchair, a nurse immediately whisked her into an assessment room. While Suraj parked the car, I gave the receptionist the necessary details. Sue was then seen by what I took to be a paramedic, and shortly afterwards her wound was cleaned, glued, and re-bandaged.

Amazingly, we were home within two hours, just in time for tea. Sue was feeling much better and, to my surprise, ate a hearty meal despite the ordeal.

That evening, we said farewell to Sarah and her family, who traditionally celebrate Lee’s Boxing Day birthday with his parents. Shortly after, Jamie, Ruth, and Joey also left to return home. Then, very early on Boxing Day, Jamie and Ruth flew to Budapest for a few days of well-earned R&R.

 

Just before the festive period, I visited the doctor about my poorly foot and was advised to have an X-ray. I was told to call the department on 28th December to arrange an appointment, but I was too unwell and didn’t phone until I felt better on 2nd January. To my surprise, I was booked in for an X-ray on my foot and ankle the very next day. A few days later, I received a text inviting me to arrange physiotherapy and/or consider an operation.

On a brighter note, Sue seems to be almost fully recovered. Although still feeling drained, she has managed to get out and about shopping and, with a little help from me, we’ve taken down the Christmas decorations.

Yule-tide illness wasn’t limited to just Sue and me; Charlotte, Ellis, and Lee’s mother, Diane, also succumbed to the same bug. All in all, this is one festive season I’ll be glad to see the back of!

On a wet Sunday afternoon, 8th January, Sue and I paid a visit to the Rothwells. It was the first time I had left the house since Christmas Eve, and although I was still not feeling 100%, it was a welcome change of scenery and gave us an opportunity to see the fruits of their recent decorating. Though not quite finished, the rooms looked tastefully furnished, modern and pleasing to the eye.

A couple of days later, we travelled to see Jamie in Waltham on the Wolds on an even wetter day. Ruth was at work and Joey at school, so we thought we’d provide Jamie with some company during his enforced isolation. He had seen the surgeon in Leicester a few days earlier and had been warned not to engage in any physical activity that might strain his back for at least the next eight weeks.

We decided to have lunch in one of the local pubs, but unfortunately, the village pub was shut on Tuesdays. The pub in the next village was closed for ‘much-needed R&R’, and the one after that, although open, was effectively closed due to an ongoing wake and wouldn’t be serving food for another hour and a half. Undeterred, we pressed on and eventually found a hostelry on the outskirts of Grantham that was serving food.

With our stomachs full, we briefly returned Jamie home, stopping only for a quick coffee, before driving back to Harborough.

On the third visit by an electrician, the earthing fault affecting the garage and house was finally resolved. I had first reported the issue on the 23rd of December, and it took until the 11th of January to get it fixed. During that time, the garage doors were inoperable, and both the fridge and freezer had to be powered via a very long extension lead trailing from the far side of the house.

The culprit turned out to be a nail in the study wall, one that had held a picture in place for at least the last eight years. It had pierced through the wall just enough to short the neutral and earth wires on a ring circuit. A simple but maddening fault.

Meanwhile, the news in the UK has been dominated by Prince Harry and the release of his memoir, Spare. It’s hard to muster much sympathy for someone from such a privileged background, particularly when he keeps throwing his own family under the bus in his (perhaps justified) war with the press, while simultaneously using that same press (via Netflix and TV interviews) to claim he loves them and wishes for reconciliation. One cartoon I saw rather perfectly summed up the general British sentiment about this royal debacle. Thank heaven he is the spare, and not the one we’ll ever actually need.

It wasn’t until the end of January that I was both well enough and had the time to create the Palmer Family Christmas video, long overdue, but a satisfying way to draw a line under what was, in many ways, a fraught and chaotic festive season.