After the holiday… tips for getting over the gloom

We got home at 3.30 this morning, hot foot from Cornwall. Cornwall was very very wonderful – relaxing, scenic and memorable.


The way home was full of looking forward to it, getting back on with stuff, charged with possibility. But then, after a very few hours of sleep, there’s unpacking and laundry. Mail, email and scribbled notes. Lists to write, weight to lose and some other stuff I can’t quite bring myself to think of yet. 


So I wrote the title to this post in the hope that I will be inspired and thus find the zip for my doodah again.


Dive in to the laundry or leave it? Currently on load number four and hardly even reaching the foothills. I’d like to report that doing laundry as we went would lead to a reduction in this, but it didn’t. Not a jot. New plan needed. Maybe dumping it somewhere for a few days, soon-to-be-sacked postie style might do it. 


Get organised with the shopping. Feeling like a hungry refugee as you gaze at furry cheese, mushy veg and lumpy milk in the fridge doesn’t improve matters. Next time have the grocery delivery van arriving at the door as you do. Alternatively go out/ dial a pizza. 


Don’t stand on the scales or check your bank balance. At least for a couple of days. 


Do something with the children. They don’t seem to be at quite the same stage of slack jawed inertia as their parents. Can’t understand why. It would have been a good idea to organise something for them to do. That way we wouldn’t have had Boy Three waking us at the crack of coffee time saying: “I don’t like it here. Can we go back to our cottage now?”


Get the house cleaned. Tick. The lovely Kim was here while we were away. Nice that. 


Get the other stuff done too. You know. The bits of plastering, painting and other bits of miscellaneous fixing done. They are even more annoying than before. The flaky bit of paint in the bathroom that needs glossing – paint already bought. The drippy gutter that makes a wet mark on the window sill. Make sure that you take good care of your gutters with regular gutter cleaning to avoid clogging.


Be prepared for dead stuff or growing stuff. I’m rubbish at gardening, but it seems to me that things will have shrivelled or sprouted. Both will need dealing with… unless you are fortunate enough to be on Mr Bloom’s client list.


Look on the bright side. Oh yes, this is always good. At least you will have mirrors you can see your chin hairs properly in, a forgotten episode of Silent Witness to enjoy, and a husband who will cook supper. The annual Trivial Pursuit game with aforementioned husband is over for 2012. And when the family slinks off to their respective rooms, there will be silence. 


Look forward to something. Next year’s trip. The weekend at a theme park competition prize. Your new project. This year’s book. Something shiny that isn’t just the inexorable slide to wrinkles, confusion and death. 


Open the gin and jelly babies. And/or have a bath. It will feel better tomorrow, won’t it? 

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