A Patient and Patience needed

Tuesday 29th August
Overcast skies have moved in over night, matching Amanda’s mood, she has somehow caught a cold and is not happy about it. We postpone our Hampton Court Palace visit, we may have the opportunity later on in the week but let’s see how the princess feels, one has to be at their best when visiting relatives. Although since this was Henry the eighths palace a few princesses didn’t make it out again with their heads intact, that would fix a sore throat right!

The phone issues continue, we discover that making an international call or text on a prepaid phone is going to need a visit to the bank manager. I have breakfast alone, but either side of me are examples of English eccentricity, the couple to my left, already seated when I arrive are waiting for their porridge and have waited for quite awhile buy the sounds of their protestations. I order some toast and a coffee and go off for some juice and muesli. When I return the couple are delivered eggs and bacon, while still eating their porridge. They immediately send the food back, then having finished their porridge ask for the eggs and bacon back again, only to send the food back again because the bacon is not crispy enough for their liking. Meanwhile an extremely thin middle aged lady on my right is weighing two packets of pre packaged Weet-a-bix (a breakfast cereal comprised of wheat flakes compressed together to form light rectangular biscuits), on a tiny pocket scale the size of a mobile phone she has produced from her bag and placed on the table. She calls over the waitress and asks her to compare, obviously the packaged weights differ, between them they choose one and the waitress pours the cereal biscuits into a bowl and the lady proceeds to pour her milk on them and eat them.

Meanwhile I have devoured my muesli, juice and nearly all my coffee but still no toast has arrived. Glancing around hopeful of a toast delivery I see the thin lady next to me has had a stack of toast about a 10 inches high delivered to her, I had heard her order the toast earlier, thin toast she had requested very thin. She is now comparing each slice to see which is the thinnest, again calling the waitress over to give her opinion. When they finally decide which is the thinnist she sets to eating the slice leaving the rest on a side plate, very peculiar to say the least. Meanwhile I am still waiting for my toast, then the waitress arrives and asks me for my cooked breakfast order, no cooked breakfast for me I explain, I just want the toast I ordered, she scurries off to fetch the toast that thankfully arrives soon, I dare not ask for another coffee it could be weeks before it arrives. I had watched the waitress yesterday morning while waiting for a second cup of coffee, their coffee refilling system revolves around taking your cup to a bar for a server behind the bar to fill, the bar staff are of course busy, so the waitress fills out a slip/order for the coffee and takes off to wait other tables, when she arrives back ten minutes later there are several cups on the bar with a variety of slips that take another ten minutes to sort through, if your lucky you might get another coffee or may be someone else’s tea. Obviously it’s a health hazard to carry a hot pot of coffee around with you in the UK. This is England I start thinking Fawlty Towers.

Having finished my breakfast, entertaining though it was, I go up to the room to check on the patient. Not improved she has fallen back to sleep but wakes when I disturb her with my movements around the room. I have to sort out the phone situation plus I now have a shopping list of pharmaceuticals, so I take off across the common and down Wimbledon Hill to the Vodafone store. The Vodafone people are helpful explaining that I don’t need to use their services, rather that of their internet competitors Viber or WhatsApp. Since this only works if you have a wifi connection, and we are uncertain as to how ours will be in the coming river cruise weeks, I leave screaming! Next stop. Boots the chemist, where a bewildering array of foreign brands confront me, I manage to pickup an immune booster, a throat deadener, a cold system reliever and some throat soothers, just in case the deadener doesn’t work. Pounds lighter in my wallet and pounds heavier on my arm, I walk back up the Hill and across the common, taking pictures along the way of any points of interest I may have missed yesterday, eventually arriving at our very own mansion on Wimbledon common. 

Oh, I haven’t mentioned the Wombles, these are a famous creatures that appeared on the common after myself and family left in 1961. We spotted several in the gift shop at the Windmill museum but they where all stuffed.

Amanda is still asleep when I arrive back but soon awakes at my rustling of parcels. I coax her from her bed for a shower and a sit in the garden so that we can have the room serviced. Grumpily she agrees and I take off to wander the garden of 35 acres and await her call. 

We meet in the garden a little later, under the shade of beautiful maple tree with a circular teak bench around the trunk. The air temperature is warm around 25 degrees, no wind and becoming more overcast, but no sign of rain. After awhile we take a walk around the extensive gardens, some in disrepair and some dating back 300 years. There are Rose gardens and extensive plantings of small trees and large. Azaleas, rhododendrons, wisteria over wooden trellises and every where garden benches for just sitting and contemplating.

 Eventually stomachs call for food and we head inside to sit in the hotels lounge bar for a sandwich, tea and coffee. 

After which our room is well serviced and we can retire to it for a quiet evening of recovery. We decide to watch some news as we have barely seen any in weeks, the TV is on the blink and we have to wait for a tech to fix it but eventually we see some news, prominent is hurricane Harvey and the devastating flooding of Houston. We order some room service and relax before an early night, an interesting day.