The past few days I have been feeling very tired and probably not my usual bouncy self. I think it is just post-holiday blues. It is cold, mild by comparison to some of your winters but none the less winter to me. It has been raining on and off and so is cold and damp and for a few days we lived without even seeing the sun. Every time I go outside I track in mud. Woe is me eh?

There was to be a big birthday BBQ today, the weather is fine, the sun almost shining but the little boys have the diarrhoea and so they can't come over, so I am cooking soup and wondering if there will be another day ahead when we can get it right and finally get that birthday cake alight with candles. Having a winter birthday is the pits, this postponing it until....has happened to me a lot. And the weather often puts a dampener on events too. Oh for a summer birthday with a picnic at the beach and fresh seafood and...well it's nice to dream. Of course when I was born, in the northern hemisphere I was a glorious summer baby, my fault that I came to the topsy turvy world called Down Under eh?

Today I went to church as usual. Yesterday was an unusual day as one of the organisations I belong to provides the catering for a local drama festival so in my six hours of volunteering I got to watch five one act plays put on by local drama groups. As I rarely get to see a live production it was really a treat for me to see the world through the plays performed. All plays, twelve in all are one act plays with a cast of two or three, all must be under an hour in time including stage setups and demounts so it is fairly basic but very worth watching.

Ray is enjoying being back home and out on his verandah again but I am not enjoying the clean-ups that result from his incontinence. It is as if we are starting all over again. There really is nothing I loathe more and I can see why in a lot of cases this is the straw that breaks the camels back and results in putting someone prematurely into a nursing home situation. Even with love in my heart and the best will in the world it is still a beastly job to have to do. And I know a lot of other caregivers feel the same.

I have tackled my first assignment for my course, I have two a week. I will sit down and draft the other this afternoon and hopefully then start working on the assignments for week two . I had planned that Thursday was going to be the completion date for one, Sunday for the other but it is amazing how life gets in the way of my best laid plans. I had an extra appointment and a care worker came to review Ray's paperwork on Thursday and that was enough to throw the system out. All I can hope to do I think is have them completed by the time they are due for marking late in July. I am not aiming to get a distinction in the course, just to cover all the work and get a pass.

One of the things that is making me feel blue I think is the fact that my Cairns family are in Sydney for three days at the Salvation Army's National Congress. Sydney is only an hour and a half's drive from here but due to their work load they will not get up to see us so it is a case of "so near and yet so far". I love my kids and I love my grandkids and frankly I think I am pining for them a little right now. It is unfortunate we are such a mobile people these days and families suffer a feeling of disintegrating into small pieces as we move further away from each other.

Ray has been difficult too the last few days. He is back in denial. Every time I ask him to do something and come back he hasn't done it. Small things like picking up his electric shaver and having a shave before we go out, or cleaning under his fingernails, fetching his teeth from his room etc. these are all easy jobs for him to do. But he has got used to sitting while the good natured aides do everything for him while he was in respite. It always takes a week or two for him to get used to being back at home again. And when I ask him why he hasn't done something it is because I didn't tell him, he couldn't find them etc. So I am back to having to find, fetch and carry again.

I should stop feeling sorry for myself and get up and do something. Sorry for the whinge. I hope tomorrow will be a day full of lovely surprises for us all. Dreaming again eh?