A blue sky kind of week

4 to 7 March 2015

The Tuesday afternoon hailstorm was short lived and, by Wednesday morning, it was back to blue skies by the time I left for work.  For a change I decided to take a slightly longer route along the river with lovely glimpses through the fences and gates to all the moorings there. The water was flat and calm reflecting the boats moored under Cobden Bridge and I couldn’t help smiling to myself as I made my way to the office. It was going to be a busy week with two members of staff on holiday and a new one to train so I needed all the calm views I could get especially as I was still expecting Commando’s stomach bug to kick in at any moment.

Thankfully, all remained calm on the stomach front, if not in the office. With so few of us there was little time for anything but answering the phones and some of the calls were difficult to say the least. It probably would have been better if the new member of staff hadn’t been call listening with me when a very angry man started the call by saying “I want you to write all this down because I’m going to sue you.” He then spoke so fast I could hardly keep up. Even so, I did get the gist of his problem. Apparently the bus had left five minutes early and he’d sprained his ankle running for it. He was going to sue us for the pain and suffering of his sprained ankle and the resulting time off work. He was also unhappy that he’d called to tell us all this three days ago and we hadn’t come back to him yet. When I eventually got his details I found the complaint he had already made along with the answer. Sadly, I didn’t think he was going to like it.

“The depot have investigated your complaint,” I told him, “in fact their reply came back to us this morning. They’ve checked the GPS on the bus and it left the stop at the correct time.”
“That,” he said, “is a load of bulls***. That bus is supposed to be at that stop at 9:55 and it left at 9:50, I checked the time on my iPhone. Are you trying to tell my my phone had the wrong time? I think not.”
“Let me just check the timetable,” I suggested, “Perhaps there’s been some misunderstanding.”
“You can check what you f***ing well like, I’m still going to sue you,” he snarled.
By this time I had the timetable in front of me and I couldn’t help smiling as I looked at it. “The timetabled time for that bus is actually 9:48 from your stop sir,” I said. “Would you like me to email you a copy to avoid this problem in the future.”
“You’re all liars,” he said as he slammed the phone down.
Luckily it didn’t seem to put our newby off and the next few calls were routine timetable requests and lost property.

The mornings are getting appreciably lighter now so there’s no more getting up in the dark and on Thursday the rising sun was painting the clouds outside pink as I ate my breakfast. There was another beautiful blue sky walk to work with sunshine to brighten up the boats under the bridge and turn the river sky blue. Despite a less than pleasant introduction to the type of calls we get the newby came back which was good news. Busy as we all were the feeling of spring in the air seemed to cheer everyone up and even an accident in the afternoon that brought in more calls than we could handle didn’t dampen our spirits.

A change is as good as a rest they say and I’m lucky to have a few different choices of route for my walk to work. On Friday morning I decided on the Big Bridge and was rewarded with some beautiful crocuses on a garden wall for my efforts. The sky wasn’t exactly blue but it was trying hard to be and the clouds and tiny slivers of sky reflected prettily in the river as I crossed the bridge. The fact that the westbound carriageway looked to be almost finished was another thing to make me smile.

Another thing that put a smile on my face was the sight of swans gathered on the corner by the boardwalk. Last year’s cygnets are fully grown now and their feathers are slowly turning white. It won’t be long before there are a new crop of fluffy ugly ducklings to make me smile.  Then there was Paddy the staffie running up to greet me like a long lost friend at the end of the boardwalk.

The sun won its battle with the clouds and by mid morning there was blue sky again. At lunchtime there were bees buzzing round the heather in the little office garden. Sabrina was flapping about wildly terrified they were going to sting her. Even when I told her bees are unlikely to sting unless they have a good reason she didn’t believe me. For me they were just one more welcome sign of spring.

Being Friday we had the normal rash of lost property calls including no less than two from people who had somehow left their false teeth on the bus. Seriously, I am not making this up! The mind boggles as to how this could possibly happen, I mean, why would you take your teeth out on a bus and, if you did, how would you not notice you didn’t have them when you got off? You have to pity the poor person who finds them too, there is something a little creepy about a pair of abandoned false teeth.

The lighter mornings meant that even the Saturday walk to work wasn’t exactly dark. When I left home there was enough light to easily see my way. The sky was blue, deep midnight blue and by the time I got to Cobden Bridge a pretty tinge of pink was visible in the east behind the waterside flats. As I walked I watched it slowly getting bigger and brighter and, by the time I got to the slipway, I could tell it was going to be a glorious sunrise.

On the walkway past the Millennium Flats I looked across at Clausentum Quay remembering my weekend walk and wondering if there was anyone sitting on their balcony watching me. Beautiful as the sunrise would undoubtedly be I had an office to open so, dragging my feet a little and looking back every few steps to make the most of the beginnings of it, I had to leave it behind.

With a week off ahead of me I spent most of the day trying to make sure I left everything straight and tying up all the loose ends I could. At lunch time I was pleased to see the bees were still frolicking in the heather and the honey bees had been joined by one big fat bumble bee. Now all I need is another week of blue sky and sunshine so I can get some nice spring walks in. Fingers crossed!