Other recent things
The biggest news in my life is still undoubtedly that I went on holiday, but here are some other things going on.
I had to get a new phone! My previous one was a 2015 Samsung A3, and I was very attached to it. It was small enough for my tiny hands! Unfortunately it recently decided to stop working one thing at a time, 2019 just seems to be the year that all my technology needs replacing.
I couldn’t get the bluetooth to connect to our speaker during one of the recent times we had guests, and then I realised, that I couldn’t get it to work with our selfie stick on the Mount of Olives when I was trying to get a camel in the image behind us. So it had been a problem for a while. The wireless connection started constantly crashing, and the phone rebooted every time I wanted to do something as intensive as delete an old photo. It got a bit ridiculous so I ordered an Oukitel C12. It’s undeniably a budget phone, but it does everything, doesn’t seem to be full of bloatware (something I absolutely hated about my Samsung), and the camera has the same specs as my previous one. Which might not be amazing but I’m happy enough with them.
The only annoying thing is that when I was reading about it online, I kept seeing that it had a USB-C connection. So I bought a couple of adaptors for my existing cables. Phone gets here, and it’s the same old connection! But it’s fine, Kadek’s phone is USB-C anyway and having adaptors around will be handy.
A definite positive of having a new phone is that the emojis are better! I can now use dinosaurs straight from my phone instead of using the EmojiOne (now JoyPixels) keyboard on my laptop.
I’m unfortunately in one of those phases where, because my migraine Botox has worn off, I’m constantly feeling disoriented and awful and I spend a lot of the day sleeping, or trying to.
A problem for us is that our letting agents do not respect the law, particularly laws about getting permission from tenants 24 hours before turning up. They hand out keys to workmen without telling us, and then random men let themselves in. This happened before when I was naked in bed having a horrendous migraine. The man had the nerve to complain about my “unrestrained dog.” Anyway, because of this we got our door chain, so that random men or estate agents letting themselves in, do not get very far.
The problem is, in times like this I am sometimes so ill that I can’t get out of bed in the morning to put the door chain on after Will leaves for work, and even if I can, I can’t get back downstairs to take it off again before he gets home. This means that I lie in bed super anxious and not getting any real rest.
We’ve discovered a solution to this problem; a little alarm system!
While it’s mainly intended to function as a burglar alarm, it has a setting that makes it go bing-bong whenever the doors are opened. So now, on days when I’m stuck upstairs, I don’t need to worry about getting down to put the door chain on, I just turn the system on with the remote. If it bing-bongs, and I glance at the clock to see that it’s way too early for it to be Will, I can then try and deal with it. It’s been nice so far for letting me know when Will gets through the door. I love it!
There’s also a panic button on the remote that sounds the burglar siren, which I think is great. If the alarm goes off, everyone can check that everyone else in the house is OK and then see which, if any, doors/windows were opened.
I definitely had a Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared ear bleed moment when I tested the button.
I’m impressed with how well the bing-bongs work even though the two parts of the sensors don’t line up properly on our doors!
I had a spontaneous visit from Kadek recently that I was quite happy about! Dan and Rob were coming up to see us and Kadek managed to join them. She was quite literally the most drunk I had ever seen her and it was fun.
Main stuff going on at the moment is BBQ preparation. It’s always an awesome time and I’ve got to think of all the small things that people won’t even notice but they’ve still got to be ironed out.
And then there’s the question of when we’ll move into the big family house. We’ve seen some we like but it’s a question of getting deposit money together. I’d be surprised if Will and me were still living here just the two of us by Halloween (also our wedding anniversary), but having a Halloween housewarming would be super cool! I’d probably be in the lounge watching movies with whoever wanted that while I imagine Will would be doing something different with everyone else. I wanted to go back down to La Baronia for an anniversary dinner with close people too. It’s a bit stressful to think as far ahead as Halloween right now though. BBQ for now.